


52 Snapshots with Ralph and Sue: A collection of tales chronicling the love between two weirdos

by Electrickittenshark



Category: The Flash (TV 2014)
Genre: Action/Adventure, Comedy, F/M, Mystery, Romance
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2018-03-30
Updated: 2018-08-19
Packaged: 2019-04-14 20:15:52
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 33
Words: 41,755
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14143710
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Electrickittenshark/pseuds/Electrickittenshark
Summary: A series of tales chronicling Ralph and Sue's relationship from the start of their friendship to the start of their marraige. This is my version of how Sue Dearbon would meet and fall in love with Ralph Dibny on The Flash.They team up and deal with all kinds of weird shit together. The list includes but is not limited to: meta-human trafficking, meta-human experimentation, alternate dimension shrimp, space cops, demons, super powered zombies and of course, the shinning indigo octopus who always wants a hug.





	1. Ralph shares his origin story with Sue

**Author's Note:**

> As a writer, I have avoided writing romances because it is incredibly easy to write a sappy, clichéd and unbelievable love story. When I started experimenting with genre I chose to write about one of my favorite comic books couples: Ralph and Sue. At first I only wrote a couple of mini fics but then I decided to write an entire series tracking their relationship. The question driving this series is: Can I write and develop a believable romance between two people? Ralph and Sue are not the most famous couple in comic books, but they are the most fascinating to me. It is incredibly rare to see a healthy and long lasting marriage in comic books. Their relationship felt surprisingly real and it is the kind of relationship people can see themselves being in. The conflict in their love story isn't ‘Will they, won’t they?’ or ‘Will they get back together?’ The conflict revolves around the question ‘How are they going to get through things together as a unit?’ That makes for more interesting story than the typical relationship melodrama we see in TV shows or films.
> 
> Marriages and relationships can fall apart easily, yet we see healthy and happy couples. The real mystery is how do they maintain the relationship? How do these people end up growing old together? I wanted to use Ralph and Sue’s romance to answer those kinds of questions. Just like the CW’s Flash re-imagined Ralph’s character, I re-imagined Sue’s character in order to add more layers to her. When I wrote Sue, I wanted the reader to be able to imagine Sue having her own adventures, because she is her own person. I tried to capture her core personality traits from the comics, but since I wanted to make her Ralph’s equal partner I changed her skill set to complement his. Their relationship starts with Ralph and Sue becoming friends. This is the starting point because friendship is the best foundation for any relationship. At the end of the day they are best-friends who are madly in love with each other and I hope to capture that in my stories. 
> 
> There will be 52 ‘snapshots’ in total and they are in chronological order. Some of these capture silly and sweet moments between Ralph and Sue, others are longer with a focus on plot and characterization. I hope that you enjoy reading their journey as much as I enjoy writing it.

 

It didn't take Detective Dearbon an eternity to figure out that the cute P.I. working at CCPD and Elongated Man are the same person.  It’s not like he changes his voice or wears a mask that _actually_ hides most of his face. Sue casually called Elongated Man by his real name and Ralph panicked like crazy. At first, he tried to shrug it off, but Sue has the world’s most accurate bullshit-detector, so they eventually end up getting coffee together and hanging out at Ralph’s office.

 **Sue:** So, what’s your origin story, Elongated Man? 

 **Ralph:** You see, I was bitten by a radioactive rubber band. **_(Laughs)_** Okay that’s not what happened. What actually happened was that a drunk Ralphy got struck by dark matter on a bus. Everyone knows that dark matter does weird shit to your cells. At first I thought it was some kind of magical coincidence but it turns out it was part of some snooty super-powered professor’s convoluted and stupid plan.

 **Sue:** You guys basically fought Pinky and The Brain last year, right?

 **Ralph:** Pretty much. Anyways, after I saved Joe’s ass, Barry busted into my office in a totally _not creepy_ way and asked me, “Hey man, do you want to wear a ridiculous costume and punch people in the face?” And I was like “M’kay.” Then we had our little Rocky montage. I chickened out a bit, got a pep talk, chickened out some more, ate a bomb for breakfast and got some more pep talks. I saved day, got a sexy costume **_(winks)_** and got a not so sexy name.

 **Sue:** What’s wrong with Elongated Man?

 **Ralph:** It’s so…. **( _cringes_ )** awkward 

 **Sue:** Well, I like it. I think it’s kind of charming in a dorky way.

 **Ralph:** Really? I mean, I guess it's not that bad.

 **Sue:** I have to say mauve suits you, but there is something missing. The suit **_obviously_** needs more sparkles. Preferably something shiny.

 **Ralph:** Please, my current suit is miles above the prototype.

 **Sue:** C’mon the prototype can't be that bad.

Ralph smirks and takes out his phone to show Sue a photo of his old ugly ass suit. Sue blankly stares at the photo, before cracking a smile. She desperately trying to hold back her laughter. 

 **Ralph: _(Sighs)_** It's okay, you can laugh at me. 

 **Sue:** Oh god! What…What… **( _laughs hysterically_ )** what is even happening with eye holes and the…the **( _chortles_ )** like knot at the back?

Ralph buries his head in hands, seething in shame and embarrassment. He quietly peaks through his fingers to see Sue laughing and smiling.

 **Sue:** It’s like Zorro decided to buy his costume from the flea market and he fell in a cement mixer afterwards. I’m so sorry Ralph, but how the hell did anyone take you seriously? 

Ralph smiles and shakes his head.

 **Ralph:** They didn't. You know something, it got really uncomfortable sometimes. Like the suit had this tendency to stick to all the wrong places.

Sue raised her eyebrow and a sly smile crept across her face.

 **Sue:** Maybe from a certain viewpoint it stuck to all the right places **.**

 **Ralph:** I can't believe that I actually slept in that thing.

 **Sue:** What I can't believe is that fact that all of your enemies actually kept a straight face when you wore that suit. If I was a supervillain and I saw a guy in _this_ costume stretching like a cartoon character, you wouldn't even have to fight me. I would just pass out laughing.            

 **Ralph:** Well Cisco basically said, “It's this or you can fight crime naked.”

A devious smile spread across Sue’s face.

 **Sue:** Well, I don’t think fighting crime naked would be that bad. **_(Mummers to herself)_** I wouldn't really mind that.

 **Ralph:** What?

 **Sue:** Ralph, you are so casual with your secret identity that you may as well fight crime naked at this point. How many times have you “forgotten” to wear the mask?

 **Ralph:** I dunno.

 **Sue:** And I thought Barry did a shitty job of hiding his secret identity. So, can you really, stretch any part of your body?

 **Ralph:** Yes, I can. I can even stretch my p-

 **Sue:** Eye balls!

 **Ralph:** What?

 **Sue:** You could stretch your eyeball and use it like a magnifying glass.

 **Ralph:** Wait a minute, why didn't I think of that?

 **Sue:** Ralph, what is the point of having these cool powers if you don't use them to do weird things?

 **Ralph:** You think, my powers are cool?

 **Sue:** Ralph, you are basically an indestructible cartoon character, that is awesome!

 **Ralph:** Well I was thinking about turning into a giant bouncy ball and crushing my enemies. I could go: bounce, bounce, bounce and then SMASH!

 **Sue:** Or you can enhance your hearing by stretching your ears.

 **Ralph:** Or I could loop myself around into a rubber band. I could be the longest human rubber band, then I can stretch myself half way across the world and fling myself at the villain’s face. **( _Speaks in a high pitch voice_ )** SLAAAAAAAAP!

 **Sue:** Or you can enhance your sense of smell by stretching your nostrils! 

Ralph gets a dorky look on his face and he stretches his nostrils.

 **Ralph:** You mean like this?

Sue bursts out laughing and nods her head.

They continue to brainstorm weird ways of using Ralph’s powers while munching on donuts.

 

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Author's note:  I didn't want Sue to fall into the same trap was Patty where it takes her forever to figure out her boyfriend's secret identity and that becomes a source of conflict. Nope, Sue figures out Elongated Man's real identity pretty quickly, firstly because Ralph ain't very discrete and secondly because she has a pair of eyes. 
> 
>  


	2. Let our powers combine!

Ralph gleefully prances into CCPD with his donut stash and coffee. After years of exposing cheating spouses, he had finally gotten the chance to work on real cases. CCPD had been short on detectives and cops for a while and with Joe’s recommendation Singh had decided to hire Dibny to do some of the investigative work.

 **Ralph:** Hey there! You mind passing on the files for—

 **Officer Otto:** Not now. I’m busy. Go away.

 **Ralph:** C’mon Singh told me that I could ask you for any—

 **Officer Otto:** How about this…you can stick to dealing with cheating spouses and leave the important cases to the real detectives, Stretchy Man. 

Ralph is fuming at this point. He tries to resist the urge to expand his palm and punch the smug idiot in the face.

 **Ralph:** You know what I think?

 **Officer Otto:** Oh, you actually have enough brain cells to think?

 **Ralph:** I think you are just jealous of how far I can stretch my p—

 **Sue:** Heeeeey! Who wants free donuts?

Sue quickly shoves a donut into Office Otto’s hand and pulls Ralph away from Otto. She drags Ralph into her office and punches him in the arm.

 **Ralph:** Ouch! 

 **Sue:** Ralph! What the hell! You are not going to make friends here by bragging about how far you can stretch your schlong. 

Ralph’s face shrinks and he feebly looks at his feet.

 **Ralph:** I wasn’t going to say that.

 

Sue sighs and stretches Ralph’s nose until he looks like Pinocchio.

 **Sue** : **_(Says sarcastically)_ ** Of course, you were going to brag about how far you can stretch your palm!

 **Ralph:** Sue I don't have the patience to deal with bureaucratic nonsense. These Muppets are slowing me down and making my job harder. I want to help people! I don't get it. Why did they hire me, if they are just going to waste my abilities and time?

 **Sue:** I know his behavior is kind of petty and stupid. But, just step outside of yourself for a minute and consider his point of view. The cops here still harbor a lot of resentment and anger against you for what happened.

Ralph starts replaying his memory of having his badge and gun stripped away in his mind, over and over again. He remembers Captain Singh’s look of disappointment and how everyone basically treated him like an untouchable when he walked out of CCPD. Sue places her hand on Ralph’s shoulder.

 **Sue:** When you committed perjury, you dragged CCPD’s reputation through the mud. Incidents like this damage the public’s trust in the police. It's no surprise that everyone here still holds a grudge against you. 

 **Ralph:** Well, what am I supposed to do, Sue?

 **Sue:** Look, lashing out and biting back isn't going to win them over. You have to earn their trust and respect again. You’re a good detective. They will eventually pull their head out their asses and see that. Till then, you have to keep doing good work.  Be the bigger man, Ralph. **_(Smirks)_** Metaphorically speaking, of course.

 **Ralph: ( _Smiles at Sue_ )** I guess you’re right.

 **Sue:** You know what, maybe you can help me. 

 **Ralph:** How? 

 **Sue:** I am one of the few detectives who is trying to crack down on all of the meta-human trafficking and experimentation. The other cops here aren’t too keen on working on this problem. 

Ralph gives Sue a shocked and disappointed look. 

 **Ralph:** But why?

 **Sue:** Well, because a lot of people here are biased against metas. They think most meta-humans get their powers, go nuts and then decide to kill people and rob banks.

I can understand why they think like that. A lot of cops were killed and injured during the meta-human attacks.

Ralph winces for a moment, as he realizes why CCPD was short-staffed.

 **Sue:** You have a lot of experience with missing person’s cases, right? 

 **Ralph:** Yes.

 **Sue:** Can you help me track down and rescue all of the kidnapped meta-humans?

A huge smile stretches across Ralph’s face as his eyes lit up with hope and excitement.

 **Ralph:** Hell Yes! **_(Shakes Sue’s hand fervently)_** LET OUR POWERS COMBINE!

Ralph starts singing the Captain Planet theme. Sue giggles for a bit, before she joins him and starts singing with him.

 

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Author's note: When I started out writing their romance I wanted Ralph and Sue to be equals. So it made sense to me to make them partners who solve crimes together. Season 4's focus is on Ralph proving himself as a superhero, in this series he has to prove himself as a detective too and earn back the respect of his peers and even his family eventually.


	3. Phantom Detective

Sue tries to sift through the gigantic pile of old files in Ralph’s office while Ralph researches possible leads on the missing meta-humans.

 **Sue:** Ralph, how the hell do you even find anything in here? This place is a disorganized mess!

 **Ralph:** Well, I’m sorry if I don’t label and color code everything like you do.

Sue sighs for moment and keeps looking for anything useful. She notices a stack of labelled and color coded shoe boxes. 

 **Sue:** What are those for?

Ralph freezes for a moment as Sue slowly opens the boxes to find his comic book stash.

 **Sue:** Wow. These are like those old pulpy detective comics. **_(Says in a deep dramatic voice)_ ** Phantom Detective and the Booby Trap Murder! Where did you even get these from?

 **Ralph:** Well, my grandpa passed them onto my dad who passed them onto me. I have been hoarding them for years.

Sue thinks to herself _, ‘Oh, god he has actually gone through the trouble of laminating them._ ’ Sue shakes her head in disbelief as she stares at the cover of one of the comics.

 **Sue:** Captain Satan, the king of detectives?

 **Ralph:** Captain Satan was overrated, now Phantom Detective he is awesome. He can do a bunch of cool stuff. He is a forensics nerd and he can disguise himself and he can escape from any trap, like a boss!

Ralph starts flipping through the pages with a sense of childish glee.

 **Ralph:** God! This brings back so many memories. **( _Smiles with a nostalgic look in his eyes_ )** I use to build a pillow fortress every night and I would go _undercover **(chuckles)**_ to read comics past my bedtime. I used my cute little flash light to read everything. I remember getting my own cheap ass magnifying glass from one of those cereal box contests.

 

Sue finds Ralph’s dorky passion and obsession with old detective comics, incredibly endearing. She spots comics with a less than “appropriate” cover. 

 **Sue: _(_ _Says sassily)_** I can see why you read these in the dark. 

Sue picks up the Spicy Detective comic and points at the cover. 

 **Sue:** Why is there a naked lady with her hands tied back? Are you sure that these are appropriate for kids?

 **Ralph:** The comics were totally PG, I promise. The naked lady isn't a part of the plot at all. It’s just a marketing ploy. **_(Sighs)_** I know this sounds stupid, but after I read these comics I kinda use to fantasize about being this sexy detective who would dramatically run down dark alleys with the wind blowing his long coat on a cold and misty night. I kind of got to do that, I guess.

A look of regret sweeps across Ralph’s before he starts chucking at some of the ridiculous covers.

 **Sue:** I guess being a detective was your dream job. 

 **Ralph:** Yeah, it was. But you know being a discount detective is good enough. 

 **Sue:** Hey, forget about what Otto said about PI’s being discount detectives. You can do a lot of good as a P.I. As cops, we have to deal with a butt load of red tape and paper work. _( **Says angrily)**_ God, I hate the paper work!

Ralph pats her shoulder in solidarity. The paper work _was_ the worst part of the job.

 **Sue:** What I am trying to say is that as a PI you have a lot more freedom and flexibility. You should make the most of it.

Ralph smiles at Sue, but unfortunately for him Sue has noticed something red and yellow. Sue has diabolical smile on her face as she picks up the red and yellow action figure. Ralph’s face scrunches up in fear. 

 **Ralph:** Oh, I don't like that look.  

 **Sue:** I see, someone is a Flash fanboy.

Sue presses the button on the back of the Flash toy and it starts vibrating.

 **Ralph:** DON’T TELL HIM! **_(Starts begging)_ ** Please don't tell him. Barry will rub this in my face for the rest of my life.

Sue starts laughing maniacally, as her adorably clenched claw shaped hands rise dramatically. 

 **Sue:** Yes, I’m _totally_ not going to use this as blackmail material.

 **Ralph:** What’s your price?

 **Sue:** You have to buy me five cups of coffee **AND** you will binge watch the Thin man movies with me.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Author's note: I remember seeing one scene of Ralph reading a comic book and I thought maybe his love of mysteries came from comic books. I think that being a Detective was Ralph's dream which is part of the reason why he teams up with Barry, because Barry told him that he has a shot of being a real detective again. Sue is a bigger fan of noir films than comic books, but the point is that they have similar interests. They have the same thirst for mystery.


	4. Body Language

**Ralph:** How did you figure out that Barry was the Flash?

 **Sue:** _**(Scoffs)**_ Please, it’s not like Barry is _that_ vigilant about hiding his secret identity. There are just too many signs. Like how the Flash disappears for six months and Barry just happens to go on a mysterious sabbatical at the same time. The _just_ Flash happens have to the same height, same build and the same eye color as Barry. The fact that there’s always these whoosh, whoosh sounds in the precinct. The fact that Barry can eat ridiculous amounts of food and not gain a pound, which I am totally jealous of. Barry talks about the Flash as if he was experiencing what the Flash was going through. The biggest giveaway for me was how Flash and Barry have a lot of the same mannerisms and verbal ticks. ( _Squints her eyes in suspicion_ ) Coincidence? I think not!

 **Ralph: _(Scoffs)_** C’mon, you can't tell a person’s secret identity based on body language alone.

 **Sue:** You will be surprised by how unique verbal ticks and mannerisms can be from person to person. For example, Barry shakes his head a lot.

 **Ralph:** Kind of like a bobble head. Yes! **( _Fist pumps_ )** I knew that I wasn’t the only one who noticed Bobble Head Barry!

Ralph shapeshifts into Barry.

 **Ralph:** _**(Shakes his head)** _ We _have_ to stop Devoe. **( _Speaks_ _in a serious and solemn tone_ )** We _have_ to get more pudding.

 **Sue:** **( _Giggles_ )** Cisco has an oral fixation.

Ralph shapeshifts into Cisco.

 **Ralph:** When he is angry his voice will start out really low and be he will be a bit passive aggressive. BUT then **( _raises his voices_ )** he suddenly starts yelling at you.

 **Sue:** Caitlin uses a lot of adorable hand gestures during her scientific explanations. 

Ralph shapeshifts into Caitlin.

 **Ralph:** Yes, your cells have polygamized due to quantum beams and ‘quantrons’ **( _imitates Caitlin’s hand gestures_ )**. Here, this super science goop will fix _all_ of your problems.

 **Sue:** When Iris figures something out or when she comes up with a plan, she snaps her fingers and points at stuff.

Ralph shapeshifts into Iris and starts snapping his fingers multiple times until he starts doing a silly finger snapping dance. At this point, Ralph and Sue start tearing up as they laugh together. 

 **Sue:** You are enjoying this way too much.

 **Ralph:** What? Now that you have pointed these things out I can't un-see it.

 **Sue:** Well I notice these weird and tiny details about people. I can't help it. 

 **Ralph:** Well, what about me?

 **Sue:** Oh, don't even get me started with you. I could write an entire book about your mannerisms and verbal ticks. But, if I had to sum it up— you’re basically sexy Jim Carrey. 


	5. Fire-breathing dolphins

Ralph and Sue are walking out of a movie theatre while having a very intense and heated argument.

 **Sue:** No! No! No! It's not possible!

 **Ralph:** It's totally possible!

 **Sue:** Ralph, it’s ridiculous. It’s bullshit. It’s ridiculous bullshit!

 **Ralph:** C’mon Sue! We live in a city that has been attacked by a telepathic gorilla and a Man Shark! So, a Shakrnado isn't that much of a stretch. The Weather Wizard could totally use an army of sharks to attack Central City with a Sharknado. Heck, it could probably happen tomorrow.

 **Sue: ( _Says with a deadpan expression on her face_ )** Are you _really_ trying to win this debate with the power of stretchy puns? ( ** _Sighs_ )** Okay, riddle me this Detective Donut, how can a shark survive inside a tornado? 

 **Ralph:** I got two words for you— mutant sharks.

 **Sue:** Mutant sharks?

 **Ralph:** They’re mutants because of dark matter. Dark matter explains all of the weird shit, okay?

 **Sue:** Okay, but last time I checked there weren’t that many sharks around Central City. How would you get a butt load of sharks in one place? It's not like the sharks went, " _Hey Bro, let’s hang out by Central City on Tuesday or something_." 

 **Ralph:** **( _Squints his eyes_ )** They are _telepathic_ mutant sharks.

 **Sue:** What the he—

 **Ralph:** So, the telepathic mutant sharks are probably in cahoots with the Weather Wizard. They combine their forces and decide to take over Central City, because that’s what you do with a Sharknado. 

 **Sue:** Or maybe there is a guy out there who can control fish and a Sharknado is his ultimate power move.

 **Ralph:** That’s an even more plausible explanation! See, it’s totally possible.

 **Sue:** Wait a minute, if mutant gorillas can exist, then does that mean that there are other animals out there with super powers? Do we have sloths with super speed or psychic rats or fire-breathing dolphins?

 **Ralph:** **( _Gasps dramatically_ )** Oh My God Sue. **( _Whispers_ )** You are asking all of the important questions!

 **Sue:** **( _Sighs_ )** Ralph, what are we doing with our lives?

They both laugh hysterically over the fact that they wasted an entire hour on this stupid debate and yet, they wouldn’t mind wasting their time like this together.


	6. Sue’s Philosophy

Ralph and Sue are heading to Jitters together, after successfully managing to deal with another meta.Adam was a teen whose dormant meta human gene got activated after a near death experience. He could synthesize crystals out of thin air. The poor kid wasn’t actually out to hurt others, but he wanted use his powers to end his own life instead. Unfortunately, he lost control of his powers and he ended up shooting crystals shards at other people. Ralph formed an elastic dome around Adam and Sue so no one else could get hurt. He used his hands to deflect the crystal shards being shot, while Sue slowly walked towards Adam and tried to talk to talk him down. She managed to calm Adam down until she could place the meta-human cuffs on him. Although, Ralph could swear that he saw Sue’s eyes glowing for a moment. 

 

Sue reaches out to pay for the coffee, but Ralph gently pushes her hand away.

 **Ralph:** Nopity nope nope! It’s my treat.

Ralph smiles at Sue and pays. Little did he know that she is an evil mastermind and she will find a way to give Ralph his five dollars back.

 **Ralph:** I can't believe it, I actually got a drink named after me **( _Slurps_ )**.

 **Sue:** Well, that’s how you know that you have made it as a superhero.

 **Ralph:** Well, you were the real hero today Sue. I mean c’mon, I was just a human shield. 

 **Sue:** Well I think you’re downplaying your part, Elongated Man **( _Smiles at Ralph with pride_ )**. If you hadn’t believed in my hunch and backed me up, it would have been a lot harder to approach things more peacefully. 

 **Ralph:** Everyone else just wanted to take him down, but you knew he didn't want to hurt anyone else. How could you tell?

 **Sue:** Well based on his past, behavior and body language I could tell that he was displaying suicidal tendencies. He has a history of depression and anxiety. I think after his meta gene became active, it changed the chemistry of his brain and exasperated pre-existing mental illnesses. I can't imagine dealing with trauma of barely surviving one of Trickster’s attack on top of all of that.

 **Ralph:** Damn Sue, you pulled some serious Dr. Phil shit today.

 **Sue:** Well, I use to do that kind of thing for a living.

 **Ralph:** Really?

 **Sue:** Yes, really. You know before I became a cop, I was a therapist. I mostly dealt with trauma victims and towards the end of my stint as a shrink, I was even a therapist at Iron Heights.

 **Ralph:** Why did you switch jobs?

 **Sue:** After providing counselling for a while I was slowly starting to realize that victims of crime get mishandled by the legal system and most cops don't get the necessary training to deal with and spot mental illness. I thought to myself, “Hey, maybe I can do things differently.”

 **Ralph:** You mean—more fabulously!

He raises his eyebrow in a cartoonish way.

 **Sue: ( _Chuckles_ )** When I started out as a cop I wasn’t really taken that seriously, because my approach wasn’t as aggressive as my peers’. **( _Sighs_ )** I just think that escalating a situation when there is a more peaceful and practical way of dealing with things is pointless and stupid. You know my nana, had this saying: Don't kill if you can wound, don’t wound if you can subdue, don’t subdue if you can pacify, and don't raise your hand at all until you’ve extended it. That’s my philosophy.

 **Ralph:** Amen. **( _Continues to slurp his drink_ )** I dunno it still seems like a huge ass leap from therapist to cop.

 **Sue:** Is it though? As a therapist and a cop, I get to meet really complex and weird people. To me the greatest mystery in the world is the human mind.

Sue finishes her coffee and quietly sneaks five dollars into Ralph’s coat.

Sue thinks, ‘ _Yes! He didn't notice. Ninja Sue strikes again_.’

 **Sue:** I’m actually thinking about dropping by Adam’s place to make sure that he is doing okay.

 **Ralph:** I’ll come with. 

They take the 405 bus to Adam’s place. Ralph quietly watches the funny expressions on Sue’s face as her mind starts to wander. He presses Sue’s nose and makes a ‘boop’ sound. She snaps out of her daydream and looks at him with an embarrassed expression on her face. 

 **Ralph:** Whatcha thinking about?

 **Sue:** **(Her _eyes light up with joy_ )** I know that I will sound a bit silly, but do you like ever sit in a bus, look at the people around you and wonder, ‘what is like to be like that guy?’ Every person on the bus has their own fears, insecurities, biases, strengths, desires, dreams, losses and flaws. Everyone has their own intricate, colorful and rich life story. It's like every person is a living and breathing mini universe. **( _Smiles adorably_ )** Isn't that amazing? 

A completely smitten Ralph Dibny just shyly nods his head.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Author’s note: 
> 
> In order to really develop Ralph and Sue’s relationship, I need to flesh out my version of Sue Dearbon. There are some elements from the comics that I am keeping such as Sue being a part of a really rich family but I have changed her profession, skill set and some of her backstory. At the end of the day she wants a lot of the same things as Ralph does. She wants to: help others, protect people and solve mysteries. That’s part of the reason why she is drawn to Ralph. By the Way, Nana Dearbon’s saying is one of my favorite comic book quotes and it’s from Wonder Woman Vol 3 #25 by Gail Simone.


	7. Sort of psychic

Ralph has just discovered that Sue was a meta and she had gotten her powers the particle accelerator explosion. The room is filled tension. Ralph tries to hide how disappointed and hurt he feels, which is totally pointless by the way because Sue can sense emotions. 

 **Ralph:** Why didn't you tell me?

 **Sue:** I-

 **Ralph:** I mean, you know about my powers why couldn’t you tell me about yours? Sue, I thought we were partners….

 **Sue:** Well, I’m not like you and Barry. I’m not going to take my mask off and tell everyone Randy on the street that I have powers.

Sue immediately starts drowning in guilt when she notices the hurt expression on Ralph’s face.

 **Sue:** Look, you need to understand something important about me. For the last five years, I have dealt with this crap alone. I rarely, if ever talk about my powers. I had to figure out how to control and hide my powers by myself. My own family doesn't even know about this. You are one of the two people that I have shared this part of myself with. 

 **Ralph:** Oh. **( _Speaks softly_ )** I mean, it must have been really scary dealing with stuff on your own. 

 **Sue:** Last time I was dumb enough to trust someone with my secret, it backfired badly.

 **Ralph:** What happened? 

Ralph sits down next to Sue and listens carefully.

 **Sue:** Well, he was in the military and he was my boyfriend at that time. When I first discovered my powers, I had a full-blown panic attack. Charlie was the first person who knew about my powers...and…he um…

Sue tries to hold back her tears. She covers her eyes with hand, trying to hide the feelings of pain and betrayal in her eyes. She stands up and turns her head away from Ralph. 

 **Ralph:** Sue’s it's okay if you don’t feel comfortable telling me this.

 **Sue:** He tried to drag me to General Eiling. He told me that I should think about the possibilities. My powers could be used for psychological warfare.  **( _Laughs bitterly_ )** I just ran away from Central City after that.

Ralph’s looks at Sue with pity and sorrow in his eyes. He reaches out to Sue and hugs her.

 **Ralph:** Sue, why did you come back after all of that?

 **Sue:** Once I heard about all of the meta-human trafficking and experimentation, I felt like I had to come back. I had to help. I couldn’t just suppress my powers, by numbing my emotions and hiding for the rest of my life. I was _this_ close to being General Eiling’s guinea pig and I don't want anyone else to be in that position.

 **Ralph:** Why didn't you go to Star Labs for help when you got your powers?

 **Sue:** At the time, I thought they just wanted to shut up all the metas and sweep them under the rug. It doesn't help that they had no problem with throwing a bunch of metas in a pipeline prison without a fair trial.

 **Ralph:** Yeah that was messed up. But they don't do that anymore, you know?

 **Sue:** I still don't trust them completely. **_(Pauses for a moment and looks at Ralph)_** But, I trust you.

She playfully punches Ralph in the shoulder and smiles at him. 

 ** _Sue:_ _(Says earnestly)_** Please, do a better job of hiding my secret than you did with hiding _your_ secret identity. 

 **Ralph: _(Laughs)_** Okay, I can do that. So, what can you do exactly?

 **Sue:** Well, I’m an empath. I can sense and project emotions. I can heal people’s minds. You know that kind of stuff. I can’t do anything cool like creating ice slides or turning into a human slinky.

 **Ralph:** So, you’re like a psychic mind ninja?                                      

 **Sue:** Ralph, **( _Laughs_ )** you make my powers sound a lot cooler than they actually are.

 **Ralph:** Well, I think your powers are pretty badass **.**  

 **Sue:** Am I even technically a psychic? I thought you had be a telepath to be classified as psychic. Do empaths count as psychics? 

 **Ralph:** I dunno. I guess you’re sort of psychic?

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Author’s note: I know that Sue doesn’t have any powers in the comics aside from a few weird scenarios where she was a ghost and she had Ralph’s powers for a bit. But, I think that empathy as a superpower isn’t explored that much and I wanted to explore a unique power in my story. Her character in the comics is a pragmatic and level-headed foil to Ralph’s dorkiness and goofiness. I want to keep that. 
> 
> Sue is very vigilant about hiding her powers but Ralph being the nosy guy he is, figures things out. Due to what happened with Charlie, she has deep-rooted trust issues. It takes time for her to trust other people and become open with them. Her passion for helping metas who are being trafficked and experimented on partly comes the fact that she struggled with her powers and that she almost became General Eiling’s guinea pig. Sue’s power is a key part of her characterization and her relationship with Ralph. I will explore the nature of her powers in future snapshots. Plus, it may be a certain speedster’s fault, at the end.


	8. Fallout from Flashpoint

Due to an incredibly vindictive person trying to tear Team Flash apart, Ralph and Sue had found out about how Flashpoint has affected their lives. Both of them were sitting next to each other in Ralph’s office and blankly staring at the ceiling. Sue hands Ralph a bottle of Gingold, while chugging down what’s left in her own bottle. She feels completely cheated by fate and Ralph, well his feelings are more muddled. He feels like an idiot for the feeling the way he does. He is struggling to grapple with his feelings of disappointment, anger and confusion. He has been avoiding Barry for some time. What is he supposed to say to Barry? Everyone else seems to have gotten over the whole Flashpoint thing, but Ralph can’t accept that a man he has admired for so long had no problems with messing up the timeline for his own selfish reasons. Ralph thinks to himself, ‘ _Barry didn't just ignore how his actions would affect his family and friends. He just didn't give a shit about how his choice would affect complete strangers_.’

Ralph didn't know what he should feel. On the one hand, he was happy that he is alive. But on the other hand, he is horrified by how easily Barry can abuse his powers and change everyone’s lives. Sue can sense the bitterness and existential fear brewing inside of him. The weight of his emotions is slowly suffocating him. She grabs his hand and takes a deep breath.

 **Sue:** You know back when I got my powers, I use to fantasize about waking up in alternate universe where I was a normal person without any powers. **( _Laughs caustically_ )** I actually had a normal life before Flashpoint. Well as close to normal you can get in this weird ass city. **( _Looks down at her glowing hands with frustration_ )** I didn’t have to deal with _this_ absurd nonsense.

 **Ralph:** Holy shit, I was dead. I was actually dead in the other timeline! I didn't even survive the particle accelerator explosion.

Ralph starts laughing nervously and Sue looks at him with a worried expression.

 **Ralph:** I’m not even supposed to be alive. I’m basically a time zombie!

Ralph slams his bottle down and sinks lower. 

 **Ralph:** **( _Speaks softly with a look of utter despair on his face_ )** Does anything I do actually matter? All of the choices and progress I make can be undone just like that. **( _Speaks with a tone of anger and vitriol_ )** All because one idiot thought to himself, “Hey, I feel like screwing with the fabric of time and space, **( _throws up his hands_ )** whoops Ralphy is dead again!”

 **Sue:** Barry’s choice to screw up the timeline was selfish and stupid. BUT— I can understand why he did it. Who wouldn't be tempted to go back in time and save their loved ones?

Ralph is shocked. He thinks, ‘ _Wait, is she actually defending Barry? She chewed him out for illegally imprisoning metas in the pipeline prison. Why is she okay with this_?’

 **Sue:** I know that you’re thinking, ‘ _Why is she justifying his behavior_?’ I’m not justifying his actions but I can empathize with him. When I say that I understand what someone is going through, I mean it the most literal sense. I can actually feel Barry’s grief and anguish over losing his parents. I have dreamt about the moment that Barry saw his mother and father die in graphic detail. **( _Sighs_ )** At the end of the day, Caitlin and Cisco may love and forgive Barry, but I can still sense their buried resentment and pain. Ralph your feelings aren't stupid, it’s okay for you to feel anger and resentment over what happened. Even if you’re technically alive because of Barry’s mistake.

Ralph finally realizes why Caitlin and Cisco they were uncomfortable talking about how Flashpoint affected them.

 **Sue:** Don't tell me that Caitlin wouldn't use that power to save Ronnie or that Cisco wouldn’t try to go back in time to save his brother. **( _Speaks solemnly_ )** Honestly, I would do the same, if I had that power. 

Ralph pulls Sue in for a hug. Sue decides to lighten the mood a bit. She presses his nose with her finger and makes a ‘boop’ sound. Ralph cracks a weak smile in response.

 **Sue:** You know how easy and tempting it is to abuse time travel? Think about it, Ralph. I mean how convenient would it be to use time travel to fix really petty and dumb stuff. Like if Barry was a really sore loser who lost a game of Monopoly, he’d be like, "Well I guess I gotta go back in time to “ _fix_ ” things". 

Sue picks up Ralph’s Flash toy and starts waving it around.

 **Sue:** Then he goes Whoosh! Whoosh! “Fix” stuff! Whoosh! **( _Smiles_ )** Imagine if that’s how Flashpoint happened. 

Ralph chuckles for a bit, before becoming completely silent.

 **Ralph:** It's just kind of horrifying when you think about it. Everything you know, your past, your circumstances, your relationships, all of that could change because of one snap decision to fudge with the timeline. The worst part is that you wouldn't even know about it. I know that I am going to sound like a dumbass for saying this but, the past is supposed to be the past! It should be fixed. How can I trust what I am, if anyone can go back in time and screw up my past?

He buries his head in hands and rubs his eyes in frustration.

 **Ralph:** How do you even start making sense of something like this?

 **Sue: _(Squeezes his hand)_** I don’t know, Ralph **.**

She places her head on his shoulder.

 **Sue:** I know one thing though, obsessing over alternate timelines and what could have been isn't healthy. We need a dumb distraction.

 **Ralph:** Do you want to eat pizza and watch a stupid movie together?

 **Sue:** What movie do you have in mind?

 **Ralph:** **( _Gets excited_ )** Ghost detectives! Okay so there is this couple that solves crimes together and the wife dies. The husband does some kind of satanic ritual and after he dies, he gets re-united with his wife as a ghost. Then they use their magical ghost powers to solve mysteries together. 

 **Sue:** Ralph, that sounds ridiculous. **( _Thinks about it for a moment_ )** Oh my god, we have to watch it!

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Author's note: I know that a lot of fans joke about how The Flash showrunners can use Flashpoint to explain away any plotholes. For example, Ralph Dibny being alive in Season 4 when in Season 1, Harrison Wells stated that he was dead, it is explained by Flashpoint. Then I thought to myself, how would Ralph actually deal with something like Flashpoint? We can joke about Barry screwing up the timeline, but there is an element of existential horror of some guy basically changing your entire life without your knowledge and you would have no control over it. 
> 
> Due to the nature of Sue's powers, she feels cheated by fate but Ralph's view of identity, his past, and reality as something concrete is challenged. He has to grapple with the fact that these things are transient and tenous. One thing that I find compelling about this couple from the comics is how do they actually manage to stay together and be happy when all these horrifying world-ending things are happening. I think Ralph and Sue are the kind of couple who deal with "the absurd" with laughter, jokes, sarcasm and gallows humor. In my version of their romance, humor is one of the things that makes the foundation of their relationship.


	9. Nose Wiggles

**Sue:** Ralph, I know that I’ll come off as a conspiracy nut, but I think someone is experimenting on the meta-humans in Iron Heights. 

 **Ralph:** Well, it’s not that much of a stretch. Iron Heights is shady as shit. **( _Smiles proudly_ )** I would know, I busted in there once.

Sue looks at Ralph with shock.

 **Ralph:** Don't worry I went in there to bust out Barry when he was framed for murder by an evil super-genius on a flying, teleporting wheel chair.

 **Sue:** Oh **( _nods her head_ )**. Of course. 

Ralph pauses dramatically, before exclaiming his classic catchphrase. 

 **Ralph:** I smell a mystery!

Ralph wiggles his nose. Sue squints her eyes while looking completely befuddled.

 **Sue** : Did you just…wiggle your nose?

 **Ralph:** Yes, yes, I did.

 **Sue:** That’s adorable.

 **Ralph:** You’re adorable!

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Author’s note: Elongated Man isn't just a superhero, he is a detective too. In fact, he is meant to be the second best detective in the DC universe and the show hasn't fully delved into Ralph's detective side that much. In the Flash TV show, he has been set up as a very observant man who spots little details. When Joe, Cisco, and Ralph go to Dwarf Star's house, he actually points out the miniature version of the car which Joe described Rundine using to escape. When he sees Joe with his ziplock bag at Devoe's house, Ralph notices that he is holding is carpet fibers from Barry's loft. 
> 
> The set up for Ralph being a good detective is there and I want to explore that part of him in the series. Meta-human trafficking and experimentation have always been in the background in the Flash. You could have an entire season arc dedicated to that concept. So I was like, 'Screw it, I'll just use it as one of the main plot threads in my series.'


	10. Partners in crime (Part I)

In the past seven months twenty people had disappeared and they had been knocked in a similar way. Barry had realized that someone was specifically targeting meta-humans after he tested the missing people’s DNA for the meta gene. Cisco had been trying to figure ways of tracking the missing metas with little success, it's almost as if they disappeared to another world. On the other hand, Caitlin was starting to remember all of the awful things she did as Killer Frost. Feelings of guilt and shame flooded her soul as she had to grapple with playing a role in trafficking other meta-humans. She slowly started confiding in Sue and Killer Frost even helped Sue rescue some of the metas that Amunet Black had sold off.

Currently, Ralph and Sue are investigating the possible experimentation on the metas in Iron Heights. They decided to divvy up the work with Ralph doing what he does best, digging up dirt like it’s nobody’s business and Sue interviewing and interrogating people. Ralph is slowly building his reputation as ‘that stretchy guy who works on weird ass cases’ but he wants to be called the ‘The Ductile Detective _’_. He didn't get to choose his superhero name, so he should get to pick his superhero detective name. He is finally starting to get more and more cases. Even the other cops at CCPD are open to working with him, but he still partners up with Sue. Solving cases with her is easily the best part of his day. He honestly wouldn't mind doing it for the rest of his life. He smiles when he spots her from his office window.

 **Sue:** Guess what I brought?

Sue holds up a familiar looking box.

 **Ralph:** Yay! Donuts!

He snatches the box and starts sorting the donuts out.

 **Ralph:** Here you go **( _gives her donuts_ )**, you like the cream filled ones, right?

 **Sue:** Wait, you actually remember that about me? 

 **Ralph:** **( _Smiles adorably_ )** How can I forget _anything_ about you? 

He starts devouring the chocolate donuts and casually takes out three gigantic binders.

 **Sue:** So, what did you find?

 **Ralph:** Well, if you want to dig up dirt on an institution always follow the money. You see Iron Heights is….

Ralph pauses for a moment and dramatically spins around in his chair. Sue stares at him in bafflement.

 **Sue:** Ralph, why did you do that? What's with all the chair spinning?

 **Ralph:** I don't know it just builds more tension and makes the reveal seem way more dramatic, I guess. 

Sue laughs softly and thinks, ‘ _Ralph Dibny, you, adorable dorky donut_.’ 

 **Ralph:** Anyways, they are —over the budget!

 **Sue:** Okay?

 **Ralph:** They are a public prison, they don't make it rain like a private prison, you know? All of the meta-dampening tech costs a fortune and it’s like 70% of the total cost. BUT, in the last seven months they have been receiving a butt load of money through a wire transfer. Now I couldn't get a name, but I did get the initials _P.E_. **( _Squints his eyes_ )** I think that in order to afford all this expensive ass tech they have let someone with way too much money on their hands experiment on the metas there.

Sue shudders at thought of metas being experimented. Ralph subconsciously senses her anxiety and gently holds her hand to reassure her. 

 **Ralph:** That’s not all. The prisoners in the meta-human wing are suddenly getting bi-weekly “health checkups”. That is shady as shit.

Sue raises an eyebrow in suspicion.

 **Ralph:** Prisons have shitty healthcare, you’re lucky if you get a checkup once in two years. It’s not like Iron Heights is known for treating its prisoners like royalty. I mean they totally didn't have any problems selling metas, so why the sudden change in heart? It has to be cover up for something else. 

 **Sue:** Why jump through all these hoops? Why not just give them away? 

 **Ralph:** Their asses have been under fire ever since everyone found out Warden Wolfe was selling meta-humans the entire time. I’m guessing, selling metas is how they covered the costs in the past. The medical check-ups started happening around the same time as the wire transfers. Seven months. Boom! Conspiracy confirmed. 

 **Sue:** Now that you mention it, when I interrogated some of the prisoners they told me that they had been experiencing gaps in their memories for the last seven months.

 **Ralph:** Did they tell you anything else? 

 **Sue:** **( _Let’s out a disappointed sigh_ )** Well, most of the prisoners don't remember what happened to the them. The ones who do, burst into tears every time I asked the about the experimentation. They are showing possible symptoms of PTSD and until we can prove that they are being experimented on they won't get the help they need.

 **Ralph:** That’s horrible. 

 **Sue:** The prisoners were showing physical and behavioral symptoms of being drugged. So, I asked Barry to take blood samples and do a bit of testing for me. He found a cocktail of different drugs in their blood. But there was a sedative in there which really stood out. There is nothing like it on the market or the database. Caitlin synthesized it and did some testing, it is supposed to impair memory and enhance powers. It’d be great if we can find it.

 **Ralph:** Yeah, that would explain the gaps in their memories. But how come some of the prisoners remember what happened to them? 

 **Sue:** Well based on my very basic understanding of things, every meta-human goes through different physiological changes. Caitlin told me that some metas have huge changes in the parts of the brain involved in memory and emotion when they get their powers. So, their brain chemistry isn't the same and maybe for some of them the drug doesn't work all of the way. Kind of like how Barry can't get drunk because his metabolism burns through the booze. It's a great thing that they recently caught Prism, because Roy Bivolo is probably really resistant to the sedative.

 **Ralph:** What did you get from him?

 **Sue:** Well he had a nervous breakdown when I kept asking him about the experimentation. I realized that maybe it’s too difficult and disturbing for him to talk about his experiences. Then I remembered Cisco telling me that Bivolo is a very passionate artist, so I asked Bivolo to draw what he went through. I thought it would be more comforting and cathartic for him to do that. **( _Takes out the drawings and shows it to Ralph_ )** It looks like he went through a sewer or something.

 **Ralph:** Sweet Fancy Moses! I know that place! That’s the place Barry went through when he went full Macgyver and pulled a prison break last year! 

 **Sue:** How did he bust out of the meta-wing? 

 **Ralph:** Barry realized that the new part of the wing was built on top of the old prison and he used that to bust out. Oh god, they are just using the route Barry used to escape to quietly smuggle metas and back and forth from the lab. 

 **Sue:** Okay, let’s head out to the sewers tomorrow and try to see if there is anything in there that can help us find this lab.

 **Ralph:** M’kay partner.

Sue smiles at Ralph and gently wipes off the chocolate icing on his chin with her thumb.

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Author’s note:
> 
> In order to make Ralph and Sue actual equals, I made Sue’s skills complementary to Ralph’s. Due to her past experience as a therapist, her specialty as a detective is reading people’s behavior and getting inside criminal’s heads. Whereas Ralph is good at spotting small details and making connections. Ralph and Sue will team up in Part II to rescue prisoners, chew gum and kick ass. Since I don't want to fall into the trap of making Sue a Mary Sue (Ho Ho, Sue puns ), I am going to firmly state her skill set from the start for reference. So, this kind of like her stats/trading card if you will:
> 
> Educational background: She has a Bachelor’s degree in Neuroscience and Psychology. Her Master’s degree is in Forensic Psychology. 
> 
> Her career path: She was a therapist for 2-3 years and then she became a cop for five years before she got promoted to being a detective. She can use firearms very well but she is trained in Krav maga as well. I picked this style of fighting because it fits her pragmatic nature as a cop. 
> 
> Her powers as an empath: She can sense, manipulate and project people’s emotions. She can not only sense the surface level emotions but suppressed emotions as well. She has to tap into her feelings of compassion in order to heal people’s minds and she can enhance people’s conscience by tapping into feelings of hope. She can resist other telepaths and empaths if she taps into her will power. If she feels a strong emotional connection with someone she can form an empathic bond. I feel the need to flesh this part out because empathy as a super power isn’t explored that much in fiction. 
> 
> So basically, if this was a RPG then Ralph is the Tank/Knight and Sue is the Psion/Esper.


	11. Partners in crime (Part II)

Ralph and Sue had finally find the place where the all of the prison metas were being experimented on.

 **Sue:** Damn. I still can't believe the conspiracy theories were actually true.

 **Ralph** : I thought hey, maybe that drunk weirdo at the bar who keeps rambling on about the how government was experimenting on alien prisoners within the sewers in the 1950’s, may be on to something. So, I decided to check it out and Viola!

Sue checks if she has everything one more time.

 **Sue:** **( _Murmurs_ )** Gun, Taser, notepad, First-aid kit, Swiss-army knife, duct tape, meta-human dampening hand cuffs… 

 **Ralph** : Geez, Marry Poppins, do you carry the entire world with you?

 **Sue:** Yup, pretty much. Okay we have to get three things done: save the metas, collect the evidence and not die.  

 **Ralph** : Cool.

 **Sue:** C’mere.

Sue stands on toes and presses her forehead against Ralph’s, his face starts feeling hot as Sue eyes glow with a violet light. 

 **Ralph:** What, what are you—

 **Sue:** I’m forming an empathic bond. This way I can sense when you are in danger and you can sense when I’m in danger.

 Ralph shapeshifts into one of the guards and Sue has disguised herself as a lab technician.

Ralph stretches his arms out, smacks the back of the guard’s heads and then slowly pulls them away. Sue ties them up and shuts them up with duct tape. They quietly sneak into the dingy old lab. Sue uses the thumb drive that Cisco gave her to bypass the firewall and collection information. 

 **Sue** : Okay Ralph, they have six meta-humans in total. There are three in the right side operating room and three on the left side.

Sue quietly starts ‘stealing’ some of the samples and files. She manages to find the memory impairing sedative.

 **Sue:** **( _Whispers_ )** Yes!

She notices a curly-haired, grumpy and sleep deprived woman giving instructions to the guards and lab technicians. She immediately recognizes her from the Amunet Black files. She hides in the corner and listens quietly.

Sue thinks, ‘ _Isn't she one of the scientists who worked with Amunet…. What’s her name— Gopika Chauhan_?’

 **Dr. Chauhan:** **( _Speaking on phone_ )** Would it kill you to give us a few thousand dollars? **( _Rants in frustration_ )** Why the hell do you people expect any results when you dumped me in this old dingy ass lab? **( _Scoffs_ )** I know that the prisoners are expensive, but what is the damn point of buying them, if you don’t have the equipment to experiment on them?! No! I can't replicate Prism’s powers yet. **( _Speaks in blunt monotone_ )** Excuse me, but who is the one who build reflective pathways for you? I did. **( _Speaks angrily_ )** So, I don't think I’m asking for the damn stars and moon here, when I ask for a few extra grand! **( _Disconnects phone and mumbles grumpily_ )** God, and I thought Amunet Black was a stingy bitch.

Meanwhile, Ralph is quietly taking out all of the workers on the way to the operating room. He turns into a stupid game where he knocks people out by flinging pens and staplers with one stretched arm. Then he uses his elongated leg to sneakily hide the passed-out guards and scientists. He stretches his leg with glee and trips over one of the researchers. Sue turns around only to find a gun to her head.

 **Guard:** You don't work, here do you?

 **Sue:** Shit.

Ralph immediately senses that Sue is in danger and a long arm speeds out of nowhere to punch the guard. The alarm tarts going off.

 **Dr. Chauhan:** Oh god, **( _rolls her eyes_ )** He’s here. Get the subjects. Kill the cop. Capture Plastic man, we’ll use him later. 

 **Ralph:** It's Elongated Man!

 **Dr. Chauhan:** **( _Says sarcastically_ )** Look, nobody cares, okay? I am too tired for this crap, just shoot them already.

 **Sue:** Ralph, get them out now!

Ralph knocks down the door to the operating room only to find Peekaboo, Prism and Top strapped to a table. He morphs his arm into a blade and starts hacking away at the straps. 

Meanwhile Sue takes cover and starts shooting back at the guards. She uses her powers to flood the guards with feelings of fear. Their legs start shaking and their punches get weaker more uncoordinated. She quickly and brutally knocks them out with a couple of swift kicks and punches. Unfortunately, Ralph gets hit by knockout gas. Dr. Chauhan is quietly standing at the entrance with a mask on.

 **Dr. Chauhan: ( _Speaks in a blunt monotone_ )** What? You didn't think we had a contingency plan for shit like this? 

Sue senses that he is in danger and immediately runs to the operating room. She smacks Dr. Chauhan down, cuffs her and steals her mask. She starts frantically searching for another mask for Ralph and she pops it on his face.

 **Sue:** Ralph! 

She quickly starts searching for something she can use to wake Ralph up. She finds an adrenaline shot and the moment she tries to inject him, the needle breaks. She looks through her bag and then she tentatively looks at her Taser. Sue thinks, ‘ _Is it worth a shot? I don’t want to hurt him…but we’re in danger and shit needs to get done…So…_ ’She sets the voltage and tries to shock Ralph into waking up. Ralph screams in a high-pitched voice and jumps up.

 **Sue:** Are you okay?

Ralph nods his head.

 **Sue:** I’m _so_ sorry for doing that.

 **Ralph:** It's okay. I needed that. I will go grab the others.

Sue drags out the three metas out and tries to wake them up as well. Peekaboo starts panicking and crying.

 **Peekaboo** : Please…please…don't hurt me…

 **Sue:** **( _Speaks softly_ )** Shh…It’s okay, don’t worry. I got you.

Sue places her hand on Peekaboo’s forehead and heals her mind.

Sue thinks, ‘ _Wait maybe she can teleport us out of here._ ’ 

Sue tries to remove the meta-dampening collar from her neck with little luck. Ralph comes out with the other three meta-humans.

 **Ralph:** Okay I got all of them. There are still a bunch of guards left and they are makin’ it rain bullets. **( _Gets an idea_ )** I know I can form a stretchy fortress and we can walk out!

 **Sue:** Wait! We need to get Dr. Chauhan!

She catches Dr. Chauhan dragging herself towards a mirror and leaping in, from the corner of her eye. She stares at the mirror with a baffled expression on her face, touches it and nothing happens.

 **Sue:** The hell? 

 **Ralph:** C’mon let’s go! 

Ralph creates an elastic wall around Sue and the other metas. His stomach deflects all the bullets while Sue occasionally pops up to shoot the guards’ shooting hand and knee. Ralph elongates his arm, to punch the guards and fling them around. They walk through the hallways while taking out the guards. After managing to get out with the prisoners, the cops eventually show up to apprehend the remaining guards and researchers there.

 

**Few hours later…**

Ralph and Sue are being interviewed by the press. 

 **Sue:** **( _Smiles_ )** Hey there Iris, it’s always nice to see you. How are you doing?

 **Iris:** I’m doing well, Detective Dearbon. Did you find out who was behind the experimentation on the prison metas?

 **Sue:** One of Amunet’s former scientists, Dr. Chauhan was running the lab. We couldn’t capture her because she escaped through a mirror. 

 **Iris:** That sounds like a lot like Mirror Master’s powers. Based on what I have heard, you are the main detective cracking down on meta-human trafficking and experimentation, right?

 **Sue:** **( _Nods her head_ )** It would be great if more cops would take an interest in this pursuit. I sincerely hope that the prisoners who were experimented on get the therapy and support they need. 

 **Iris:** Well, you have managed to pull off quiet the feat today, Detective Dearbon.

 **Sue:** **( _Smiles with pride_ )** I couldn’t have done it without my partner, **( _Points at Ralph_ )** The Ductile Detective: Elongated Man.

Sue winks at Ralph because she knows how badly he wanted to be called that. Ralph is jumping around and smiling like a giddy kid who had found a never-ending supply of chocolate donuts.  

 **Ralph:** And then I was like… **( _Speaks in a deep booming voice_ )** You can’t escape the long arm of the law! Then I punched the guy in the face.

 **Reporter Lady** : **( _Looks smitten_ )** Wow, you did all of that on your own?

 **Ralph** : Hell no! I had my fabulous partner in crime. Ain’t that right Sue?

He stretches his arm to hi-five her and their touch lingers for a bit too long, as they look at each other with mutual respect, trust and absolute adoration.

****

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Author's note: Well, this was a fun snapshot to write. There will be more snapshots in the future where Ralph and Sue work together on cases. They will intersect with Team Flash from time to time, but most of the times they deal with weird shit together. I sort of imagined Dr. Chauhan as this grumpy sleepy cat who hates dealing with people and loves money as much as Ralph loves donuts. She will come back at some point. Ralph and Sue's empathic bond will play an important part in their relationship.


	12. Butter Pecan Ice-cream

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Ralph and Sue go on a sort of but not really date. Sue gives Ralph solid dating advice, cute compliments and pecan butter ice-cream.

Ralph and Sue have been blowing off steam by bar-hopping. Sue tried to be his wing-woman and Ralph tried to hit on women. At the end of the day, the both failed miserably. Their night of fun came to an end, when one of the drunk idiots at the bar insulted Sue. Ralph in typical drunk Dibny fashion screamed ‘ _You monster_!’ and tried to tackle the guy. Sue held him back and well, now they are drunkenly trying to get back home. 

 **Ralph:** Screw the asshole who said that you’re a 4!

 **Sue:** Well, then what am I?

 **Ralph:** You are too beautiful and fabulous to be rated on a scale of one to ten. **( _Squints his eyes_ )** Obviously, you transcended the scale when you flew away with your magical umbrella.

Sue chortles and her face lights up with glee when she notices an ice-cream shop. She skips over to buy some ice-cream. Ralph didn't feel like having ice-cream or really anything at this point. He watches Sue staring at the typical ice flavors with a goofy expression of disgust on her face and making a ‘Blegh’ sound. After ten minutes of intense contemplation and philosophizing, she picks butter pecan. 

 **Ralph:** Who the hell picks butter pecan?

 **Sue:** **( _Pauses dramatically_ )** Okay, I need to drop a serious truth bomb on you —chocolate and vanilla are overrated. Butter pecan is the shit!

Ralph smirks in disbelief. Sue gives Ralph her spoon so he can try some.

 **Ralph:** Damn Sue—it is the shit.

They both laugh like drunk idiots, as they stumble across the avenue.

 **Ralph:** Well, that was a bust. No phone numbers, no compliments, nothing. I guess, sexy Jim Carrey doesn’t have it going on. **( _Sighs sadly_ )** God, I suck at picking up women.

 **Sue:** I don't know Ralph, I think you would have a better shot with women if you were more authentic and you didn't try to hide behind your sleazy bravado. There is no game or cheat sheet that allows you to win at dating. Treating women like people with complex lives and forming an actual connection is the best way to go. Just be the best version of yourself and see what happens. Also, Pro-Tip, maybe you shouldn't start with, ‘ _Hey there,_ _I can stretch certain parts of myself, if you know what I mean.’_

 **Ralph:** **( _Scoffs_ )** Please, you're basically telling me the same message as every John Hughes movie: “Be Yourself!” **( _Does jazz hands_ )**. FYI, I was being myself.

 **Sue:** No, you weren’t.

 **Ralph:** Yes, I was.  

 **Sue:** **( _Sighs in frustration_ )** I don't know why you are trying to do this whole Barney Stinson thing. Honestly, I think the idea of showing your true self to a woman who you are genuinely invested in only to be rejected and abandoned, is horrifying for you. But, you have to take risks if you want the things that actually matter in life. Ralph, at the end of the day, you’re no player, you’re no Casanova. 

 **Ralph** : Well then what am I, Dr. Phil?

 **Sue:** You’re a dork! A ductile dimpled dorky donut.

 **Ralph:** **( _Looks hurts_ )** Geez Sue, thanks for the vote of confidence.

Sue looks at Ralph with the most besotted expression on her face and smiles at him.

 **Sue:** Ralph you being a dork, isn't a bad thing. It's the most charming and lovable thing about you. Why would you want to hide that?

 **Ralph:** **( _Squints his eyes_ )** Damn you and your cute compliments!

Sue giggles and spots her street.

 **Sue:** Well I think we have to go in opposite directions. Don't worry, I can get back on my own from here.

 **Ralph:** Well then, I will call you later, you know, to make sure you didn't get attacked by killer robots on the way or something. 

 **Sue:** Wait a minute, you have my old number. That’s useless! My stupid phone got crushed by a Gorilla two days ago. 

She scribbles down her new number down on a piece of paper and hands it to Ralph, before heading back. She walks about ten feet before she dramatically twirls around and cheekily imitates Ralph’s thumbs up pose.

 **Sue:** **( _Waves enthusiastically_ )** Byeeeeeeeeeeeeeee! 

 **Ralph:** **( _Chuckles_ )**, Bye Sue, be careful!

As Ralph watches Sue waddling towards her apartment like a drunk baby penguin, he realizes that he has fallen in love with her. 

He thinks to himself, ‘ _Shit. I’m screwed._ ’

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I may have overanalyzed Ralph's character a bit before starting this series, but one of the things which really stands out about him is that he uses his sense of humor and bravado to hide his fears, insecurities and true feelings. I think it doesn't just apply to being a superhero or detective, but I think he uses a sleazy mask to hide his insecurities around love and women. Sure Ralph may look like Hartley Sawyer, but he still feels like pudgy Dibny who gets slapped in the face and rejected. He may genuinely believe that being discount Barney Stinson is the only way a woman will fall for him. Sue, the human bullshit detector, can see through his mask and she doesn't just tolerate his dorkiness but adores it. 
> 
> There is a very sweet quote from the comics which inspired this snapshot: 
> 
> "He (Flash) came by in the end to get me out of there. It was like trying to compete with Frank Sinatra. But that's why ice-cream stores don't just sell chocolate and vanilla. Every once in a while, someone walks in and orders pecan butter."
> 
> Ralph is the pecan butter ice-cream, but Sue doesn't just love pecan butter, she helps our stretchy scoop of ice-cream love himself a little bit more. 
> 
> For your reference:
> 
> https://imgur.com/a/XsJ8W


	13. Something shiny

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Ralph and Sue spend their first Christmas together. Ralph basically reverts back to his dorky clumsy teenage self, as he struggles to say three key words.

Sue heads to West household for their Christmas party. She desperately tries to hold onto the pile of presents and desserts in her tiny hands. Since her fingers can't reach the bell, she decides to press the doorbell with her nose.

 **Joe:** **_(Chuckles)_** God Sue, did you bring the entire kitchen with you? Come in.

She lays everything down on the desk and gives Joe a hug.

 **Caitlin:** **( _Hugs Sue_ )** Merry Christmas Sue. 

 **Sue:** Merry Christmas Caitlin. **( _Smiles cheekily_ )** Hey Caitlin, what’s cooler than being cool? 

 **Caitlin:** Ice cold.

 **Sue:** I said, what's cooler than being cool?

 **Caitlin** : ICE COLD!

They both chortle for a bit and exchange gifts. 

 **Cisco:** **( _Laughs_ )** God, look at them with their silly little inside jokes. We still got Bakin’ soda though…

 **Ralph** : Hmmm…

Ralph watches Sue laugh and chat with everyone there. It took a bit of time, but Sue eventually got comfortable enough to reveal herself as a meta-human to Team Flash. Once she started trusting them, it's funny how quickly she became friends with everyone. She would blow off steam with Iris at the shooting range or watch corny b-movies with Cisco or yammer on about psychology and neuroscience with Catlin. 

Ralph thinks to himself, ‘ _It took them a long ass time to even put up with me, let alone be friends with me. What's her secret? Maybe it’s her warm smile. Maybe it's her soft and kind eyes. Or maybe she is a mind controlling alien who replaced the real Sue a long time ago. Nah, that’s just stupid_.’

Ralph loves watching Sue interact with other people. He’s is always taken aback by how she actually remembers and cares about the silly little details in people’s lives. Or how she treats the janitor at CCPD like an old friend. Or how she tries to be as comforting and understanding as possible when she deals victims of crime. Cisco waves his hand in front of a distracted Ralph’s eyes. 

 **Cisco** : Ralph? You there, buddy? 

Sue walks up to him and ‘boops’ his nose 

 **Sue:** Merry Christmas, Detective Donut. 

 **Ralph:** Merry Christmas, Marry Poppins.

Ralph nervously starts gorging on Sue’s chocolate chip cookies and pretty much anything else edible there.

 **Sue:** You know what? This isn't fair. You can eat a butt load of food and still look like a male supermodel. Everyone else has to exercise and diet **( _Sticks her tongue out_ )**. Can I just steal your powers for a couple of days and go on a buffet spree?

 **Ralph:** Well, maybe I can do that next Christmas, but for now you have to accept what I got you.

Ralph nervously hands his present over to Sue. He thinks, ‘ _Shit. What if she hates it? Oh, god what if she eventually hates me and turns evil because I gave her a crappy present? She’s from a rich family, there is no way she is actually going to like my plain ass present. What if she scoffs and says in a snooty British accent, “Blegh. Pathetic. I don't know what I expected from a filthy peasant, like you”. Wait a minute she doesn’t have a British accent, so that totally wouldn't happen_ , right… _RIGHT_?’ 

 **Sue:** Wow, it's beautiful. Thank you.

Sue holds up the golden heart shaped locket with the letters S.D. engraved on it.

 **Ralph:** Wait, what? Really? 

Sue happily nods her head and puts the locket on. She gives Ralph his present. He carefully opens the box to find a white, black and gold emblem with the letters EM stylized. He has the biggest smile plastered on his face.

 **Sue:** It's for your suit. Adding sparkles to the suit was a dumb idea, so I got you something shiny instead. I mean, c’mon the best superhero ever deserves to have his own emblem, right?

 **Barry:** Best superhero ever, huh?

 **Sue:** **( _Smiles cheekily_ )** Don't worry Barry, you are a really close second. 

 **Ralph** : It's perfect, **( _Softly mummers to himself_ )** just like you. 

Barry smiles at the sight of Sue gleefully hugging Ralph and Ralph lovingly gazing at her. 

Barry thinks, ‘ _God he has changed so much. I have seen you go through the same journey I went through as a hero, Ralph. So, I know that look on your face when you see Sue, because that’s how looked at Iris when I was pinning over her_.’

Sue ends up chatting with Iris and Iris thanks Sue for all of the encouragement and scoops she had given her.

 **Barry:** Just tell her, man. 

 **Ralph:** What do you mean?

 **Barry:** **( _Rolls his eyes_ )** Everyone already knows how you feel about and her. 

 **Ralph:** Oh that. **( _Shakes his head fervently_ )** No. Not gonna do it.

 **Barry:** Why?

 **Ralph:** **( _Says sardonically_ ) **Yeah, I totally have a shot with _her_. 

 **Barry:** I know what it feels like—

 **Ralph:** **( _Rolls his eyes_ ) **Here comes the sentimental pep talk.

 **Barry:** **( _Punches Ralph’s arm_ )** I know how horrifying the idea of being rejected by the woman who means the world to you is. BUT if I could re-do my relationship with Iris then I would have told her how I felt a long time ago. It wouldn't have taken me like twenty years.

 **Ralph:** Twenty years? Really?

Barry nods his head.

 **Ralph** : **( _Laughs_ )** Wow Allen, that’s kinda pathetic.

 **Barry:** **_(Speaks bluntly)_** You know what’s pathetic is the fact that you can leap into a burning building, but you don't have the balls to tell her three simple words. 

 **Sue:** Well guys, I’m going to head back. Merry Christmas everyone!

Everyone says good bye to Sue. She hugs Ralph one more time, before heading out.

 **Sue:** **( _Winks at him and gives him a thumbs-up_ ) **I’ll see you later, partner.

Ralph thinks, ‘ _Say something. Say anything. Tell her: I like you. Like a lot. Like more than any other person out there. Like, I don't even think it's humanly possible to like someone this much and my stretchy little heart is doing a shitty job of handling how much I like you. God, I haven't felt this way about a woman for years and it’s absolutely horrifying. Just say something, Ralph. Open your fat mouth and tell her, you idiot!_ ’

 **Ralph:** Bye.

He quietly he watches Sue walk out the door.

 

* * *

**If this was a musical then this is the song Barry would sing to Ralph:**

**Shit, I really want a musical episode where Barry gives everyone romantic advice in song. He can put the sunglasses on and then do a silly little dance.**

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Author's note: In Season 4 the Christmas episode is a huge turning point for Ralph's relationships because that is when he starts considering Team Flash as his friends. So it made sense to me to use a Christmas chapter as turning point in Ralph and Sue's relationship. Sue in the comics is really loved by the members in the Justice League and she is an honorary member. I wanted to create a contrast between how Ralph develops his relationships with Team Flash and how Sue does the same thing. Once she really opens up and shares her true self, she endears herself to everyone. In the So Sue Me series, (#Have you heard of Mr. Breen's Work) there are two sides to her character. The pragmatic and dedicated workaholic as well as a kind and compassionate person who cares about other people's lives. 
> 
> Ralph basically stumbles like an awkward teen here because he hasn't genuinely loved a woman in years. Think about it, he is a guy who hits on betrayed women and goes to strips clubs. Would he really have a healthy and loving relationship during those five years? Nope. That's what makes falling for Sue horrifying. It was easy for him to go up to Amunet Black and say, " Wanna Netflix and Chill?" because he doesn't really care that much. Now, he is overthinking his interactions and choices with Sue, because he is invested and being rejected is even more painful now. There is one reccuring detail from the comic that I like. Sue is the one who gets Ralph to take superheroics seriously. She gets him a new costume and set up press events. Sure Ralph has had his police badge taken away but Sue sees him as a good detective and the best superhero ever. So she gives him his new badge if you will. 
> 
> Anyways, shit is about to get real soon because we will go back to the meta-human trafficking and experimentation plotline. Enjoy the fluff for now.....


	14. Emotional Echoes (Part I)

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> After Sue joins the growing list of misisng meta-humans, Ralph goes on a relentless search to find her. Team Flash discover an old enemy may be behind everything. 
> 
> Emotional Echoes (Part I) and (Part II) build on plot points in Partners in Crime (Part I) and (Part II) [Chapter 10 and 11] as well as Let our powers combine [Chapter 2]. It is a continuation of the meta-human trafficking/experimentation story line. 
> 
>  
> 
> Side note: The personal interview that Iris is referring to happened in the So Sue Me Series (Sixty minutes with Detective Dearbon). You don't have to read it to follow this snapshot, but it's just an extra detail. 
> 
> Link: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14147286

Ralph looks at himself in the mirror, only to find a completely exhausted man with a broken spirit. He couldn't really sleep at night, ever since Sue disappeared. Every night he is plagued with horrible nightmares of Sue being tortured, interrogated, starved and experimented on. A part of him thinks that his fear of losing Sue is tainting his dreams, but his dreams feel too real not to be true. Meanwhile, Captain Singh has been trying to use as many of his resources to find Sue. He has developed a soft spot for her because she was one the few cops who cared about the metal health of the victims. They both have a similar philosophy when it came to protecting people, it doesn't matter if you are a meta or not, everyone deserves the right to have a normal and safe life. He knows that some of the cops in the department hold grudges against metas, because a lot of cops have died or been severely injured during meta attacks. He remembers how hard it was for him to get any cops who were genuinely passionate about stopping meta-human trafficking and experimentation. Then she flew into his office, begging for the job, it was like serendipity. Singh isn’t blind, he has had a hunch that Sue is a meta which probably made her a target. 

 **Captain Singh** : Call Allen and Dibny in, Otto.

Ralph and Barry head into Singh’s office.

 **Barry:** What can we do for you, Captain? 

 **Captain Singh** : **( _Rubs his tired eyes_ )** We are swamped with the missing meta cases and a bunch of other nonsense. I want you two to investigate Dearbon’s disappearance. ( _Speaks sternly_ ) Be. Thorough. Search every single corner. I expect nothing but the best from you, Allen. I don't want to lose one of my most dedicated and hard-working detectives, do you understand? 

Ralph quietly and sadly nods his head.

 **Barry:** Yes sir. I’ll start examining her place.

 **Captain Singh** : And Dibny… **( _Speaks reassuringly_ )** everything is going to be okay.

Barry and Ralph go to Sue’s apartment to investigate.

 **Barry:** No phone. No laptop. No case file. Whatever Sue had on her last investigation is gone. Someone went the extra mile to clear up everything. 

Ralph stares off into space. 

 **Barry:** **( _Looks worried_ )** Ralph?

 **Ralph:** Her notepad. 

 **Barry:** What?

 **Ralph:** Sue had this cute little notepad where she used to scribble down possible leads and ideas. Maybe we can find that.

Barry carefully starts looking for Sue’s notepad, while Ralph stretches his neck and eyeballs to inspect every inch of the place. He spots something gleaming in the gap between her desk and the wall. He slowly picks the dart up and carefully inspects it. He stretches his nostrils starts sniffing the dart and immediately recognizes the scent of Sue’s perfume. 

 **Ralph:** This is the same knock out dart they used to kidnap the other missing metas. Sue was probably hit by this before being dragged away.  

Barry puts the dart away in a sterile test tube. 

 **Barry:** I’m going to run a couple of tests to confirm that Sue was actually hit by the dart.  **( _Picks up Sue’s notepad_ )** The last things she scribbled were “Mercury Labs” and “Project Phoenix”

 **Ralph:** Sue told me that Iris had given her a possible lead about Mercury Labs being involved in meta-human experimentation. 

Ralph mindlessly wanders through Sue’s apartment and he stumbles across the locket he had given her for Christmas. His hand starts shaking as he picks it up and notices that the chain has been broken. His mind replays the horrifying memory of Devoe murdering Izzy in front of him in mind over and over again. He starts sweating and panting as his mind starts imagining Sue’s death. He internally screams at himself, ‘ _Stop it! Just stop! Don't think about that!’_

 **Barry:** Ralph, breath. Keep it together, man. **( _Places his hand on Ralph’s shoulder_ )** I promise you, we will find her. Okay, how about this, you can head back to Star Labs. I’ll go with Joe to retrace her steps and see if there is anything else we can find.

 

Ralph heads to Star Labs, hoping that Cisco and Caitlin had figured something out. Caitlin is quietly reminiscing about the time she spent with Sue. She remembers getting wasted with her and drunkenly singing **_Hey yeah_**. Caitlin remembers creating ice slides and watching Sue slide down while adorably yelling “Sweeeee…” But most importantly Caitlin remembers all of times she cried on Sue’s shoulder and she just listened to Caitlin rambling on about her life without any judgment. 

 **Ralph** : Cisco have you figured out how to use Sally to track Sue’s emo signature or whatever?

 **Cisco:** **( _Rubs his tired eyes_ )** How the hell are you supposed to track something vague like “emotional energy”?! It doesn't help that we barely know anything about her powers.

 **Caitlin:** She’d start panicking every time we tried to study her powers. It's like she had this deep-rooted fear of being treated like a guinea pig.

 **Ralph:** **( _Buries his head in his hands and starts crying_ )** And now she has to live out her worst nightmare.

Cisco and Ralph comfort Ralph, as Iris walks in. 

 **Ralph:** Iris. 

 **Iris:** ( ** _Runs to him and hugs him_ )** Ralph! 

 **Ralph:** Iris, you had given Sue a lead, can you tell me more about it?

 **Iris:** Yeah, so basically after the whole Star Labs debacle one of my colleagues started investigating all of the other labs in Central City and Mercury Labs has been involved in some shady stuff for a year. Since Sue agreed to do this personal and in-depth interview with me, I decided to help her out a bit, you know. You remember when you guys rescued the meta-human prisoners from that old sewer lab?

 **Ralph:** Yeah. Sue and I were trying to track down Dr. Chauhan, you know before…um Sue— 

 **Iris:** **( _Places her hand on his shoulder_ )** Ralph it’s okay. She’s is going to be okay. She is a tough woman and she will survive this. **( _Clears throat_ )** Okay, so I went through the inventory for that place and I traced a lot of the tech to back Mercury Labs. Plus, I bribed one of the janitors there and he told me that they are secretly trying to resurrect one of the dead meta-humans.

 **Ralph: ( _Hugs Iris_ ) **Thanks Iris. **( _Looks up hopefully_ )** I guess I’m going to do some shape-shifting undercover stalking.

 **Caitlin:** God, I hope that he is okay.

 **Cisco** : He stopped making his corny stretchy puns. That’s like classic Dibny. **( _Shakes his head_ )** Not a good sign.

 **Iris:** You know what I don't get? 

 **Cisco and Caitlin:** What?

 **Iris:** There are millions of people in Central City and out of those millions, what four maybe five thousand people are metas. How are the people behind the meta-human kidnappings able to screen out metas from a crowd of millions? 

 **Caitlin** : Actually, Amunet had a guy. He could sense other meta-humans, he’d follow them for a while to learn about their powers and then he’d sell the information to the highest bidder. Maybe I can track him down.

 

Caitlin turns into Killer Frost and starts hunting for Hustler. She learns that he is hanging out at the seedy night club she used to work at. The entire bar turns cold and misty the moment she walks and Hustler immediately knows it’s her.

 **Hustler:** Hey there Frosty Flakes, you still doin’ Amunet’s dirty work? I thought you were a hero or something? You got your own overpriced caffeinated drink and everythin’. 

 **Killer Frost** : Shut up! ( ** _Pins him down_ )** Do you know anything about Sue Dearbon? 

 **Hustler:** Sue…who? 

 **Killer Frost:** Do you know what happened to her or not?

 **Hustler:** ( ** _Smiles sleazily_ )** I won’t reveal my clientele’s details willy nilly. I am a professional, after all. 

 **Killer Frost:** **( _Rolls her eyes and speaks sarcastically_ ) **Yes, which is why you wear a clip-on tie and stained skinny jeans.

 **Hustler:** ( ** _S_ _ **m** irks smugly_)** I am contractually obligated to keep my deals confidential.

Killer Frost points a sharp frozen dagger at his throat.

 **Killer Frost** : Well then, let me make your life easier for you.

 **Hustler:** **( _Starts sweating and shaking_ )** Oh yeah, I made a butt load of money off of her. I didn’t really get a full name or anythin’ like that.

 **Killer Frost:** **( _Asks coldly_ )** What do you have?

At this point, Hustler is pissing himself in fear and he hands Killer Frost an address and the initials for the client. Frost transforms back into Caitlin and heads to CCPD, to share the info with Barry. Meanwhile, Ralph shapeshifts into one of the janitors at Mercury Labs and starts eavesdropping. He notices a woman with platinum blonde hair and steely blue eyes, giving instructions about Project Phoenix, over a burnt corpse. They are yammering on about replicating fragokinesis. He quietly steals a couple of DNA samples from the body and heads back to CCPD.

 **Barry:** Yup. Got a match. The DNA belongs to…Bette Sans Souci. 

 **Ralph:** Who?

 **Barry:** Plastique. She was a meta who could make things explode and she ended up sacrificing herself when she blew up five years ago. General Eiling wanted to study and replicate her powers. 

Caitlin walks into Barry’s lab. 

 **Caitlin:** Did you say Eiling?

Barry nods his head.

 **Caitlin:** Well, Hustler gave me an address and it's the same place where Eiling held and interrogated Professor Stein to learn about the Firestorm matrix.

 **Ralph** : You know, Sue mentioned him too. Her ex almost revealed that she had powers to Eiling. She thinks that Eiling wanted to use her powers to mess up people’s minds.

 **Caitlin** : **( _Hands Ralph the piece of paper_ )** I couldn't get a name, but I got the initials P.E. 

 **Ralph:** Wait, those are the same initials as the person who was throwing cash at Iron Heights to experiment on the meta-human prisoners. **( _Wiggles his nose_ )** Maybe it’s all connected. Maybe the person behind the meta-human disappearances is also behind the experimentation in Iron Heights. 

 **Barry:** It’s totally possible that Eiling is behind everything. I mean, he was this ruthless and corrupt man who had no problems with experimenting on people and animals. The only thing is that he became really obsessed with Grodd, after he was brainwashed and used as a puppet. But, maybe he found out that Sue came back and he decided to take her.

Ralph, Barry, Caitlin, Cisco and Joe gear up and head to the old military lab to find Sue and the other metas. After hours of searching, they found nothing and yet, Ralph feels that Sue is close by.


	15. Emotional echoes (Part II)

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Sue desperately tries to break out of the meta-human experimentation facility while Ralph tries to figure out who is really behind the meta-human disappearances. He finally has an epiphany about his relationship with Sue and where she is.

**_One Year Ago_ **

A woman with steely blue eyes, looks at the man in front of her with pity and regret.

 **Woman:** **( _Asks hesitantly_ )** Do you remember me, Wade? 

 **Wade Eiling:** GRODD! 

 **Woman:** He’s not here anymore. 

 **Wade Eiling** : He is coming after us! All of us! He has started something! **( _starts mumbling_ _incoherent nonsense_ )**

 **Woman** : **( _Speaks softly while being on the brink of tears_ )** What?

 **Wade Eiling** : Secret society of supervillains! **( _Starts raging and ranting_ )** He’s going to take over the world, I’m telling you. WE ARE ALL GOING TO DIE! ( ** _Starts screaming_** ) Get me out of here! I know that dirty ape is keeping me in here. You're his puppet, aren’t you? GET OUT! GET OUT!

Eiling starts throwing a fit and screaming Grodd’s name. She walks out of the mental asylum, determined to a way to fix the man she loved.

 

**_Currently_ **

Sue’s interrogators have tried everything. They tried electrocution, they tried starvation, they tried to break her down but she turned out to be a stubborn pest who would taunt them from time to time. They are trying to use one of their telepaths to get information out of her, but Sue’s intense focus and concentration allows her to block him out of her mind. The people at the lab didn't know that much about her powers and yet, they don’t really feel that threatened by her. Hector thinks, _‘What? She’s not going to escape. She’s an empath of all things.’_

Little did they know, Sue has been studying her interrogator’s behavior for weeks trying to find cracks in his mind that she could exploit. She figures out that her main interrogator, Hector has severe attachment and abandonment issues. She uses a combination of her powers and understanding of the human mind to pick at Hector’s old emotional wounds. Eventually he breaks down and starts screaming at Sue. He shuts off the stasis field holding Sue in place and she falls to the ground. He charges towards her as he starts falling apart emotionally.

Sue takes this chance to head butt him and steal his key to her hand shackles. She takes his access card and his bagel, partly out of spite, but mostly because she is hungry. The guards barge in and Sue pretends to cry and be utterly mortified.

 **Sue:** **( _Wails loudly_ )** Please don’t hurt me!

One of the guard’s scoffs and thinks, ‘ _She’s just a scared little girl. Easiest detainment ever_.’ He puts his gun down and tries to grab Sue, but she kicks the shit out of him, quickly steals his gun and shoots the other guards down.

 **Sue:** **( _Mumbles in a sarcastic high pitch voice_ )** Oh, do you want to run another test, Subject 52? ( _Mumbles bitterly_ ) No thank you, I’m not interested in being your damn guinea pig!

Meanwhile, Ralph is trying to figure out what to do after his main lead fell apart. General Eiling being behind most of the meta-human experimentation in Central City was a perfectly sound theory—that is, until Ralph found out that Eiling has completely lost his mind and he wouldn't stop rambling about Grodd like a mad man. Ralph realizes that he is probably suffering from tunnel vision and he needs to step back a bit. He takes a break and quietly looks through all the files Sue collected from the sewer lab and some the stuff he has dug up on Eiling. Dr. Chauhan mostly focused on replicating Prism’s powers to stabilize moods and Mirror’s Master’s ability to travel between mirrors. There is a bunch of stuff about modifying mirrors to create pathways, but it is really boring and it slowly lulls an already sleep deprived Ralph into a deep slumber.

 

 _He falls asleep at his desk and starts dreaming_. 

A completely exhausted Sue is scrambling to find and a way to free the other metas. The woman with platinum blonde hair holds a gun over Sue’s head. 

 **Woman** : That’s enough Subject 52. I have figured out your little trick. You intentionally pretended to be weak and pathetic so we would underestimate you. Well I am not falling for your act, I know what kind of monster you are. 

 **Sue:** Excuse me, but I am not the walking human rights violation, here. You are.

 **Woman:** I am doing what needs to be done to protect the city. The meta-human population needs to be controlled and monitored. They have already ruined plenty of lives.

Sue senses the woman’s suppressed emotions of resentment, hatred and grief. 

 **Sue:** This is personal for you, isn’t it? I’m guessing that a meta hurt someone close to you. I sense a lot of anger attached to the name…Grodd. 

 **Woman:** **( _Cries out in anger_ )** That disgusting pest broke Wade’s mind!

 **Sue:** What if I made a deal with you? If you let all the metas here go, you can keep me. You can use me. I can heal his mind.

 **Woman:** NO! I’m not going to make a deal with you! I already have already hired the best therapists and doctors in the world, **( _Speaks coldly_ )** I don't need you.

 **Sue** : For the love of Beebo, his mind was shattered by a telepathic gorilla! Do you really think normal psychiatric methods are actually going to work? My empathic healing is a lot more specific and effective than any psychiatric drug out there. I’m your best shot.

 **Woman:** Why should I make a deal with you, when I can just brainwash you into doing my work for me?

 **Sue:** _( **Smirks)**_ I thought you'd realized this by now, telepathy and mind control doesn't really work on me. So, do we have a deal or not?

The woman shakes her head and takes out the meta-dampening cuffs.

 **Sue** : **( _Sighs)_ ** I guess you don’t _really_ love him that much. 

The woman screams at Sue and tries to strangle her, but Sue uses the skin contact to project emotions onto her opponent. The woman is flooded with a tsunami of fear, pain, helplessness, and dread. She starts crying and having a panicking attack.

 **Woman:** **( _Starts shaking_ )** Wh…What are you doing to me?

 **Sue:** **( _Speaks bitterly_ )** Oh no, I’m not doing anything. This is all your doing. You are just feeling the fear and pain of every meta that you kidnapped and experimented on.

Sue punches the woman and takes all of her stuff. She stops to mediate for a moment since she can slowly sense herself slipping into the darker side of the emotional spectrum. She places her hand on the woman’s head to heal her mind.

 **Sue:** **( _Whispers_ )** I’m so sorry for attacking your mind like that, but I. Need. To. Get. Out. **( _Starts crying_ )** I can't take this anymore! I can’t keep sensing all of their pain and reliving their memories. I know that you really love him. Watching him slowly lose his mind and sense of self like that, must have been heartbreaking for you. I hope you find what you need.

 

_He is jolted awake and he panics as he looks around._

Ralph thinks, ‘ _Wait a minute. These aren’t my dreams…. they’re Sue’s memories! But how_?’

 **Ralph** : **( _Smiles_ )** Of course, our empathic bond.

They are emotionally tethered to each other, in more ways than one. His nose starts wiggling and he realizes that he knows the woman in the dream. He elongates both of his eyeballs out. One eye scans through Eiling’s lab list of employees and the other eye goes through Mercury Labs’ list. He finds her name in both the files. 

 **Ralph** : Persephone Eiling. P.E!

Ralph thinks, ‘ _She was one of the scientists experimenting on Grodd and Bette years ago. She worked in Mercury labs at some point so it makes sense that would buy the place and use it to experiment on metas. Eiling’s wife is just continuing his work! She probably wanted to experiment on Prism to figure out how to use his powers to fix Eiling’s mind. But where the hell could they be? Cisco keeps saying that it’s like they are not even in this world. Wait…maybe they aren’t even in this dimension…’_

Ralph lies down on his futon and takes Sue’s heart-shaped locket out. He absent-mindedly opens her locket only to find that, she has put a picture of him inside. He gets up and starts crying tears of joy. He knows where she is. Ralph doesn't need to use his detective skills to figure out where Sue is, his heart will always find her. He drags Team Flash to the old military base with a diagram in his hand for something.

 **Barry:** Ralph, we came here last time and there was nothing here.

 **Ralph** : I know that she is here. Trust me!

Ralph stretches his ear and presses it against the wall. He hears a soft buzzing sound and morphs his hands into giant bats. He starts smashing the walls and everyone looks at him with pity. 

 **Barry:** Ralph please… 

However, everyone is shocked to see what is behind the wall. 

 **Joe:** Wait, is that…one of those secret passage way things?

They walk down the stairs and find a giant gleaming mirror. Ralph looks at the diagram, stretches his hand to the back of the mirror and starts messing with some buttons. The mirror starts showing a research facility in total chaos after Sue has busted out some of the metas. All of the metas are fighting back against the guards.

 **Cisco:** Son of a breach! They were hiding in the mirror dimension the whole time.

Ralph jumps through the mirror without a second thought.

He has finally found her.

* * *

**For your reference:**

_The lovely and cheesy panel that inspired the empathic bond:_ https://imgur.com/a/sE6a7

 

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> General Eiling was one of the most memorable and threatening villains on the Flash and the sad thing is that we don't really know what happened to him. I had my own headcanon that he went nuts after being brainwashed by Grodd and I decided to use that in my series. There is an interesting dynamic between Ralph and Sue in the comics. Sue is the more pragmatic, self-assured and level-headed person in the relationship. There is this one storyline where she is the typical damsel in distress situation but she is more worried about what Ralph is going through, than actually being kidnapped. Which was sweet, funny and kinda badass. 
> 
> At the of the day, The Flash's Ralph Dibny is a gigantic softie who panics really easily. We see this when he presses the wrong button or when he gets hit by acid. We see his more sentimental side when he keeps Izzy's CD or when he makes balloon animals to cheer up the little girl. He's physically indestructible but his heart is a bit more fragile. So I decided to make Sue, more emotionally resilient and mentally strong. Which is partly due to her experiences and the nature of her powers. That doesn't mean that she doesn't have her limits, she is a human being after all. I wanted to make her flawed and human character, with sides of her personality that clash with each other. Sometimes, the pragmatic cop inside her who wants to get shit done will be at odds with the compassionate and empathetic therapist who wants to help flawed and even horrible people heal. This dichotomy is also meant to be reflected in her powers. She can use her powers to heal and understand others, but she can also use her powers to emotionally and psychologically destroy others. 
> 
> I really got the inspiration for the empathic bond when I stumbled across a specific panel in the JLE comics, where Ralph states:
> 
> "This morning, in one of my mushier moments, I looked into your eyes, well J'onn's eyes and I said I could find you anywhere! But it's not detection Sue—that's just following my heart"
> 
> I was like hey, what if that was literal? The empathic bond between Ralph and Sue is very much a metaphor for their friendship, emotional intimacy, and attraction. It will change as their relationship changes and as I explore the true nature of Sue's powers.


	16. I have a girl to visit

Ralph is eagerly waiting outside of Sue’s hospital room. He detaches and stretches his ear into her room so he can hear Captain Singh’s conversation with Sue.

 **Captain Singh:** How are you feeling Dearbon?

 **Sue:** _( **Groans and speaks in a monotone)**_ I am not dead. Yay. 

 **Captain Singh:** _( **Chuckles)**_ I’m glad that you are okay, you have no idea how much I worried about you after you were kidnapped.

 **Sue:** How are the other meta-humans doing?

 

 **Captain Singh:** They’re okay for the most part. We managed to ID the victims as fifteen of the missing meta-humans. There are still a few of them left to find. We also managed to detain Persephone Eiling. With all of the evidence you and Ralph collected, Cecile can build a strong case against her.

 **Sue: _(Sighs)_ ** We still have a lot of work to do. There are still a lot of people trafficking and experimenting on metas—

 **Captain Singh:** Hey, you did amazing work, Sue. You were in a terrible situation and you managed to break free and help the other metas. You should take a break and relax for a bit.

 **Sue:** I’m really worried about our victims’ mental health. They were tortured and experimented on. They need proper trauma counselling.

 **Captain Singh:** Don't worry about it, I’ll make sure that they get the help they need.

 **Sue:** So, you know about me, right? **( _Asks in a tone of desperation_ )** You know what I am, don't you?

 **Captain Singh:** I won’t say anything. Just like how I haven't said anything about Allen for the last five years. Just take care of yourself. 

Captain Singh knows that Ralph’s ear was on the ground the entire time. Ralph quickly retracts his ear and stands up as Singh walks up to him. Captain Singh looks at him with pride and gratitude before he pats Ralph’s back.

 **Captain Singh:** You did good work Dibny. **( _Smiles_ )** I can see why Joe recommended you.

Singh smiles at Ralph and walks out of the hospital with his husband. Ralph smiles like an idiot for five minutes before prancing into Sue’s room like an over-excited puppy.

 

 **Ralph:** SUE!

Ralph and Sue share a warm and tight hug for a couple of minutes. They lovingly look at each other with the biggest of smiles on their faces. 

 **Ralph:** Oh god, you are actually okay! I thought…I mean, after I saw you there bleeding out like that….

 **Sue:** It’s okay, Ralph. Breathe.

Ralph calms down and sits down next to her. Sue looks completely empty and tired after everything that happened. It is hard for Ralph to see all of the light and color being drained out of her like this. He quickly starts morphing his hands into a Sue puppet and a Darth Vader puppet.

 **Sue:** **( _Asks softly_ )** What are you doing, Ralph?

 **Ralph:** I am providing some much-needed entertainment. ( _Stares at the TV with an annoyed look on his face_ ) I mean how long can you keep watching re-runs of Desperate Housewives? Drumroll please, here is—a dramatic enactment of your escape.

Ralph starts waving the Darth Vader hand puppet around.

 **Ralph:** Raaaaw! I’m an evil dickhead who wants to kill meta-humans and trap you in a horrifying shithole.

Sue starts giggling hysterically. Ralph starts waving the Sue hand puppet. 

 **Ralph: _(Says, in a high-pitched voice)_** I’m a Detective Badass and I will pull a prison break. **( _Starts bashing the two hand puppets together_ )** Pew! Pew! Pew! 

 **Sue:** **( _Laughs_ )** I think you may be embellishing a couple of details.

 **Ralph:** Hey, there is nothing wrong with taking a couple of artistic liberties.  

 **Sue:** You forgot the part where I got shot. 

 **Ralph:** I—

 **Sue:** And you left out an incredibly important main character. **( _Shakes her head_ )** How could you do that Ralph?

Sue makes a bunny shape with her hand and places it next to the Sue hand puppet. 

 **Sue:** **( _Speaks in a deep voice_ )** I’m Elongated Man. I’m here to deflect bullets like a badass and smash people by turning into a _fabulous_ mauve bouncy ball. Boom! Pow! Pow! **( _Smiles at Ralph_ )** I wouldn’t be alive if you hadn't figured out where I was and saved my ass. 

Ralph hugs her again, just to make sure that she is actually here, in front him.

 **Ralph:** Well, I think we should celebrate.

He starts taking something out of his bag.

 **Sue:** Ralph, I can't drink booze yet.

 **Ralph:** I know, which is why I got you your favorite.

 **Sue:** **( _Gasps_ )** Yes!

Sue grabs the pack of butter pecan ice-cream and starts gobbling it up with glee.

 **Ralph:** I got something else for you as well. It took bit of tinkering but I got it fixed. 

Ralph pulls out the heart-shaped locket that he had given her for Christmas and helps her put it on. 

 **Ralph:** **( _Presses Sue’s nose_ )** Booooooooop! **( _Speaks in a robotic voice_ )** Get well soon. 

 **Sue:** I will.

She cheekily imitates Ralph’s thumbs up pose.

 **Ralph** : Good, because we’re going to dance after you get out of here.

 **Sue:** ( ** _Smiles_ )** M’kay partner.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Spoilers for Season 4 episode 18!
> 
> As someone who has been writing about Ralph for some time, Season 4 episode 18 was difficult to watch. Don't get me wrong Hartley Sawyer did a fanastic job during the emotional scenes. I cried when Devoe took over his body and during Ralph's sweet MA FAMILY! speech. I am desperately hoping that he comes back and we get to see him meet Sue on the show. I am fudging my writing and posting schedule, but I think we could use a bit of pecan butter "ice-creamy" comfort here. 
> 
> This chapter was meant to be a throw back to the hospital scene at the end of Season 4 episosde 6 (When Harry met Harry), where Ralph comforts the little girl who got hurt and we got to see his sentimental side. I wanted to draw a parallel to that scene to show how much Ralph loves and prioritizes Sue at this point of the 52 snapshot series. I will finish this series even he doesn't come back, because I don't like seeing Ralph and Sue getting screwed over so much. We had the whole mess with Identity Crisis and even the hell that Ralph went through during 52.
> 
> I want that one long story where we get to see these characters shine and I will write that story. I have planned a lot of things for the series and I can't wait to share that with you :)


	17. I’ve got you under my skin

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Ralph stops hesitating like a nancy and finally makes a move, of course it gets interrupted by freaking Kite Man of all people.

**_Frank Sinatra’s ‘I’ve got you under my skin_** _’_ plays in the background as Sue and Ralph share a dance. They ended up dancing in Ralph’s office, because Kiteman crashed the gala that they were at in order to reveal and capture “lizard people”. Ralph is in his rental tuxedo and Sue is dressed like a princess of a tiny island nation. She’s wearing a red strapless silk dress, white opera gloves and golden earnings, but the thing that stands out is the simple heart-shaped locket that Ralph had given her.

 **Ralph:** It sucks that our dance got cut short by Kiteman of all people. All the important moments here get irrupted by someone. Kinda like how Barry’s wedding was crashed by alternate dimension Nazis.

 **Sue:** Wait—Seriously?

Ralph nods his head.

 **Sue:** So, you fought alternate dimension Nazis?

 **Ralph:** **( _Looks disappointed_ )** No. I didn't get to do that.  Let’s just say that I was a little bit upset about not being invited to the wedding. I mean I get it, I crashed the bachelor party, but it would have been nice to be invited! I may have gotten _just a little_ bit wasted in Vegas. **( _Sighs_ )** Damn, I really wanted to punch a Nazi in the face.

Ralph pouts adorably over the missed opportunity.

 **Sue:** You wanna get drunk?

  **Ralph:** Hell yes!

They both crash on the futon in his office and start sipping on Gingold.

 **Ralph:** Sue?

 **Sue:** Hmmm…

 **Ralph:** Are you okay? It's just I’m worried about you, you know? You have gone through a lot, you know with being kidnapped, interrogated and experimented on. I just— 

 **Sue:** **( _Shakes her head_ )** I’m not okay. Not really. I can't really sleep at night after everything I have seen. I know I had to use my powers to escape and survive, but I vindictively and viciously attacked another woman’s mind. It still haunts me. **( _Sighs_ )** But you know, I think I will be okay, eventually. I have survived a lot of crap in my life, I will get through this too. On the bright side, I’m still alive after all of that shit, so there’s that. And well, **( _Smiles at him_ )** here I am getting drunk with you so I’d say things are going really well. **( _Raises her glass_ )** To not dying. 

 **Ralph:** To not dying.

They clink their glasses together.

 **Ralph:** I still can't believe that Kiteman believes in lizard people of all things. What a weirdo. 

 **Sue:** Maybe it's not that implausible. I think we should give conspiracy theorists more credit, especially since everything got weird in the last five years. The whole thing with aliens and Area 51 turned out to be true, **( _squints her eyes_ )** so maybe lizard people are real… 

 **Ralph:** **( _Laughs_ )** Okay, I see where you're coming from. We live in a crazy ass world where there was a magical sauna that brought people back from the dead, a lady who brought statues to life and a reality warping being who taught everyone a lesson about love through the power of musicals. Maybe some of the crazy conspiracies aren't that much of a stretch. I mean what would even count as a “crazy” conspiracy theory at this point?

 **Sue:** Okay, how about this? So, the illuminati are real—

 **Ralph** : Okay.

 **Sue:** BUT it’s made up of telepathic gorillas. Gorilla Grodd went back in time, created multiple time remnants of himself and he has been using his mind control to influence humanity since the beginning of civilization. **( _Gasps dramatically_ )** We were at the mercy of the Gorilla Illuminati the whole time. 

Ralph chortles at the thought of a secret society of telepathic gorillas controlling everything. 

 **Ralph:** Okay so if magic is real, then Santa has to be real too. Hell, it’s probably a matter of time before Santa teams up with the Flash to save Christmas or something…

 **Sue:** And…

 **Ralph** : The Flash is Santa Claus! Think about it Sue, **( _squints his eyes_ )** it makes perfect sense. 

 **Sue** : So, let me get this straight, Santa Claus is pretending to be Barry Allen who is pretending to be the Flash? 

 **Ralph:** Yes! It's like a secret identity sandwich. The whole fat guy going down the chimney is bullshit. It is totally an obvious cover up for the truth. The Flash can buy all of the presents with his bottomless pit of money, shrink the presents down with a shrink ray or something and he can actually run fast enough to deliver the presents on time. Oh, and both of them _just_ happen to wear red. **( _Pauses dramatically_ )** Coincidence? I think not! 

They both laugh hysterically, until Ralph falls off the futon. Sue sits down next to him on the ground. She places her head-on Ralph’s shoulder and holds his hand. 

 **Sue:** God, you don't know how much I missed laughing at stupid stuff with you.

Ralph lovingly looks at the beautiful woman in front of him and smiles at her. 

 **Ralph:** **( _Speaks softly_ )** You know what I miss?

 **Sue:** Hmm…

 **Ralph:** Booping your nose.

Sue smiles at him and ‘boops’ his nose with her finger. Ralph leans in and slowly presses his nose against hers.

 **Ralph:** **( _Speaks softly_ )** Boop. 

They both gaze at each other for seems like an eternity, before Ralph cups her cheek in his hand and presses his forehead against hers. They end up sharing a slow and soft kiss. After they pull back, Ralph is still cupping her cheek and Sue adorably rubs his nose with her nose. 

Ralph thinks, ‘ _Holy shit! I actually did it! Woooo! And she didn’t run away from me! YES! Okay, okay, say something romantic._ ’ 

 **Ralph:** Do you like shrimp?

Ralph screams internally, ‘ _GOD DAMMIT RALPH! WHY?_ ’

 **Sue:** **( _Smiles seductively_ )** Hell yes.

She practically pounces on him and starts kissing him hungrily. They both giggle softly, as Sue strokes Ralph’s hair and he stretches his arm around her waist.

 **Ralph:** It took us a long ass time to get here, didn’t it?

 **Sue:** **( _Happily nods her head_ )** So, when are we going out to stuff a butt load of shrimp in our faces?

 **Ralph:** Now, if you want.

They end up walking out of Ralph’s office, hand in hand.

* * *

**Their song:**

_(Because every couple needs their own song)_

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> YAY! They finally got together! Ralph stumbled like an awkward dork, as usual. I know the series is called 52 snapshots, but that doesn't mean that I would have them share their first kiss in the 51st snapshot. That is not a slow burn, that's just plain evil. Or what happens in 90% of romance animes. I remember reading in one of the older JLE comics that they played Frank Sinatra songs during Ralph and Sue's wedding, hence the title and choice of song for this snapshot.
> 
> Panels for your reference:  
> https://imgur.com/a/TSDrvsh


	18. Sexy Pick-up lines

Ralph heads out to Sue’s apartment to pick her up for their date. The moment he sees her in her red dress, his jaw physically and literally drops on the floor.

 **Sue:** **( _Panics_ )** Oh god. Ralph, are you okay?

Ralph puts his jaw back in place and gives Sue a silly thumbs-up. 

 **Ralph:** It's okay. I’m totally fine.

Sue looks genuinely worried about and she gently touches his cheek. 

 **Ralph:** It’s just that I couldn’t help myself, you know because you are so— _**jaw-droppingly beautiful**._

He winks at Sue with a goofy smile on his face. At first Sue is baffled by the sheer corniness of that line and then, she is touched by the sheer sweetness of it all.

 **Sue: _(Laughs)_** C’mere.

She pulls him in closer and lovingly kisses his jaw line. He stretches his arm around her waist and kisses her forehead. Ralph does something like this every time Sue dresses up. Each and every time he would manage to melt her heart a little.

 

* * *

** Panel for your reference:  **

 

https://imgur.com/a/ruqwXcS

It's kind of sweet, pervy and horrifying at the same time. 

 


	19. Choir of ex-girlfriends

**_Hotline Bling_** starts playing and Ralph immediately recognises it as his old booty call’s calling card. He picks up the phone, ready to cut things off permanently.

 **Connie:** Sup, Ralphy?

 **Ralph:** Yeah, this thing that you use to do, where you’d come over, use my stuff, crash on my couch and have sex with me, yeah that’s not going to happen anymore. I am with someone now.

 **Connie:** Well then, I’ll just come around next week.

 **Ralph:** **( _Sighs in frustration_ )** We are in a _serious_ relationship. 

 **Connie:** Oh yeah, it’s totally going to last. Listen Ralphy, I love you— 

 **Ralph:** No, you don't. 

 **Connie:** **( _Speaks in a blunt monotone_ )** Yeah, you’re right, I don't love you. I don't even like you that much, honestly, but your relationships don't last longer than the attention span of a drunk chimpanzee.

 **Ralph** : Well, I’ll have you know that we have been together for five months!

 **Connie:** **( _Speaks sarcastically_ )** Wow. You’re breaking all the records, here. You guys will **_totally_ ** work out. Just like it worked with you and _Daphnie_ and those dozens of other chicks. What makes her any different?

 **Ralph: _(Gets flustered)_** She is special, okay? It will work. I will make it work.  

 **Connie:** **( _Says sardonically_ )** What—you gonna get married, run off to the Bahamas and solve stupid mysterious together for the rest of your life?

 **Ralph: _(Speaks softly)_ ** Maybe. 

 **Connie:** Wow. Okay. Whatever. 

He disconnects his phone in frustration and spirals into an afternoon of rumination.

Ralph thinks, ‘ _Who the hell is she to judge my relationships?_ _Well technically, I haven't been a real “relationship” for years. I’ve just been embarrassing train wrecks with mediocre sex that happen to last for a little over two weeks. I mean, after five days, Melanie just stuck a post-it note on my forehead when I was asleep and it said: Ralph, I’m dumping you ‘cause you’re a dick. Toodles, Melanie. P.S. I took fifty bucks from your wallet and I’ll totally give it back. I never got the fifty bucks back, though. That sucked. Or how about Stephanie, who basically pretended to be her non-existent twin sister to avoid me, after ten days. Like I’d be dumb enough to fall for that. Daphnie just slept with another guy behind my back and then told me that she thought her new beau was my long last twin pretending to be me, after fifteen days. Why the hell, did they keep using twins in their bullshit excuses_?’

He blocks and deletes Connie’s number with a small smile on his face.

He continues to contemplate _, ‘Hell, I can’t remember the number of times I have been ghosted after a one night stand or had a martini thrown in my face. I didn’t have to deal with that after the beer belly started showing, though. After that point, I couldn’t get another woman to touch me without throwing money at her. Jeez, I threw way too twenties at Genie. Seriously, stripper names are more ridiculous than superhero hero names. Well, Elongated Man kind of sounds like the name of a male stripper in a superhero porno. I mean, it doesn't help that I wear a tight leather suit.’_

He wonders if he should ask Cisco to change his suit, but he abandons that idea when he remembers Sue telling him how perfect his ass looked in leather. To Ralph, Sue’s cute compliments are one of the most powerful forces in the world. 

He thinks _, ‘Then again, maybe I deserved some of that…okay maybe most of it. I was a selfish and sleazy dickhead. I ghosted plenty of woman and pretended to ‘love’ a lot of them. I took Bethanie to The Golden Booty for Valentine’s day, because they had cheap chicken wings and free napkins. I gave Bonnie expired coupons for her birthday. For Christmas, Brettnie got one of those cheap orange plastic rings that I found in a cereal box when I was drunk. I couldn't stop checking out other women no matter who I was with.’_

He looks at a goofy photo he took of Sue in her penguin pyjamas, while she was stuffing waffles in her face like a grumpy and sleepy Ms. Pac-Man. He smiles and thinks, ‘ _Well, that’s not going to be a problem anymore!’_ Back when he was a wiry framed teen his mother use to tell him that he will eventually stumble across his “forever gal”. But after everything he had seen as an affair busting private investigator and after watching his own father walk out on his mother, Ralph finds the idea of soulmates ridiculous. He sees the idea of a marriage lasting more than fifty years as a delusional fantasy after all of the divorces he’s helped ignite in the name of a pay check. He thinks, ‘ _Shit, you’re lucky if you manage to make it past the two-year mark without stabbing each other in the back, metaphorically or literally_.’

He has seen wives abandon their husbands without a word and run off to the Bahamas with their lovers. He has seen husbands bail on their wives with a young twenty something, once the wife hits sixty. He has seen wives ditch their spouses for a richer, tougher man after the husband’s mental and physical health went to hell. He has seen people who touted their partner as their soulmate, having their spirits and hearts shattered after their ‘perfect’ partner cheated. There was this one weirdo who cheated on his wife with her twin sister, mother, and grandmother. Ralph internally cringes when he remembers _that_ case.

He will probably screw things up because he sucks at being romantic. As heartbreaking as the possibility of losing Sue is to him, the possibility of him breaking her heart is even more unbearable to Ralph. More than anything, he _just_ wants her to be happy—with or without him. After all of his failed attempts at relationships with women, a part of him doesn't actually except his relationship with Sue to last that long. Yet, he thinks with a tiny bit of hope in his heart, ‘ _But maybe she can stay for a bit. Maybe she’ll stick around for five more minutes or five more hours or five more days. Maybe the days can add up to weeks and the weeks can add up to months, somehow. Maybe the months will become years and maybe, just maybe I can look at her five decades from now and say: Oh, my god! Would you look at that, I have magically managed to spend my entire life with the most beautiful person in the multiverse_.’ 

Ralph snaps out of his daydream when he spots Sue on the street from his office window. She is holding up donuts with one hand and giving him a cheeky thumbs-up with the other. Her vivacious smile instantly melts all of his cynicism away and he can’t wait to work on their next case together. He presses his forehead against the window with the biggest smile on his face and lovingly looks at her walking in.

Ralph: **( _Mumbles to himself_ )** Well, I’m hoping that you’ll stick around.

* * *

  **Ralph's love life in a nutshell:**

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I know that a lot of people hated the depiction of Ralph as this sleazy guy who hangs out at strip clubs and as a writer it is tempting to ignore that part of his character. However that means that I am missing out on a way to flesh out his character. I thought to myself a guy who busts cheating spouses, hangs out at strip clubs and has a father who walked out on his mom, would have a pretty cynical and skeptical view of romance and marriage. As the story goes along marriage won't be this ridiculous and stupid fantasy to Ralph, it will end up being something that he wants with Sue. It's like you expect things to go to shit but deep down inside you are hoping that things will work out. That's what Ralph is going through in this snapshot. I like that the show is developing Ralph before they introduce Sue. There is a trope that I hate where the female lead's love is meant to fix our flawed male character (he's a jerk or he's selfish or he has a giant ego). In real life that's a set up for a toxic and codependent relationship. It's not Sue's job to fix Ralph. Ralph has to fix himself and become a better man. He has the drive to make it work with Sue and it can be a reality because now he has the empathy, maturity, self-awareness and sense of responsibility to achieve that.


	20. Uptown Girl

A homeless man has been stealing powers from other metas powers, by blasting orange beams of energy from a glowing ring. Iris has been investigating the possible of existence of aliens in Central City and she shared a lead on the stolen powers with Sue. Ralph and Sue are heading to Coast City to have a chat with Hal Jordan, in Ralph’s barely functional red car.

 **Sue:** Well, things just keeps getting weirder, huh? An alien society that protects the universe by giving random people magical glowing rings to shoot beams, fly around and create giant green sling shots. I definitely didn't see that coming.

 **Ralph:** Shit, they’re like official. They have a uniform, logo and a shmancy name. **( _Speaks in a dramatic booming voice_ )** Green Lantern Corps! I mean, they are basically space cops who get bossed around by a group of bored and immortal tiny blue aliens with nothing better to do. 

 **Sue:** Oh, my god! **( _Gasps_ )** It's my favorite song! Turn it up!

**( _Sings_ )**

_She'll see I'm not so tough_  
Just because I'm in love with an uptown girl  
You know I've seen her in her uptown world  
She's getting tired of her high-class toys  
And all her presents from her uptown boys  
She's got a choice.

Ralph giggles as he watches Sue doing a silly little dance in her seat, during the song break. He quickly kisses her hand and continues driving. After nine months of being with Sue, Ralph has learned that she appreciates the simple things in life. When he gives her a single rose, she acts like she has been given a gigantic bouquet of golden roses. She treats watching old B-movies and eating cookie dough together, like they’re going to the Ritz on a golden carriage. He buys her one tub of butter-pecan ice-cream to cheer her up and she acts like he gave her a bathtub of diamonds. She isn’t a high maintenance girlfriend, which is weird given that she comes from one of the richest families in the world. 

 **Ralph:** Sue?

 **Sue:** Hmm…

 **Ralph:** I have a question.

 **Sue:** Yeah. It's about my family, isn’t it? I can tell from the awkwardness and sweaty palms.

 **Ralph:** Why did you leave everything behind? You have a mansion and a family that’s loaded, why ditch that to work as a cop?

 **Sue:** Ralph I can understand why a life of luxury is really tempting for you. You are used to living form paycheque to paycheque. I know it seems fun at first, but I can tell you that eventually that kind of lifestyle wears you down. I remember spending my days—seeing millions of faces, shaking thousands of hands, having hundreds of pointless and forgettable conversations, kissing a dozen cheeks and not feeling a real connection to a single person in my life. You know that weird feeling of being in a crowded room with tonnes of people laughing and talking, and for some reason it feels like **_you_** are trapped in a barren deserted wasteland, all alone. 

 **Ralph:** Yeah, I know how that feels.

 **Sue:** The life of socialite is kind of empty and lonely, you know. Plus, it was boring. I mean really boring. I almost died of boredom at my debutante ball **_(Chuckles)_** Sometimes, I wish that you crashed my debutante ball and rescued me from the never-ending boredom. I needed something to do. I needed a challenge, a journey, a battle, a mystery…anything! Staying behind meant being some Randy’s eye candy for the rest of my life. **( _Makes a ‘Blegh’ sound_ )** I’m not going back to that.

 **Ralph** : What about your mom? Don't you miss her?

 **Sue** : It’s complicated, Ralph.

 **Ralph:** You know I wouldn't mind meeting her. 

 **Sue:** I don’t know if that’s a good idea 

 **Ralph:** Is it because your scared that I’ll embarrass you? 

 **Sue:** What? No! No! It has nothing to do with you! You’re amazing. It has everything to do with her. 

Sue adores Ralph, but she knows that her materialistic and image-focused mother would hate him. Her mom would probably criticise everything about him. She’d criticise his past, his gifts, his clothes, his job, his car, his education, his superhero name and worst of all his character. Sue didn't have the heart to see her mother transform into a fire-breathing dragon and blasting Ralph with her flames of contempt and disgust.

 **Ralph:** Well, she can't be that bad. 

 **Sue:** She’s a hyper controlling and extremely judgmental woman who resorts to emotional blackmail to get what she wants. As much as I love her, she’s just too toxic and I just had to cut her out.

 **Ralph:** Oh, but how you just cut out family like that?

 **Sue:** It was hard. Really hard. I still remember the day that I chose to leave home after college and build my own career. She wanted me to find a rich man and settle down early on. I really wanted to help and understand other people. My mother didn't get why throwing money at charities wasn’t good enough for me. She told me that I was just going through a phase and I’ll come back to my senses eventually. Well, this ‘phase’ has lasted for ten years.

 **Ralph:** **( _Holds her hand_ )** Maybe you can still mend things, maybe things have changed….

 **Sue:** Oh no, you don't know my mother. She is the most stubborn and close-minded woman on the planet. She could change, but it's not that likely at this point. We had the worst fight of our lives, that day. She threatened to disown me if I didn't stay. **( _Tries to hold back her tears_ )** I just packed my bags and walked out. Haven't walked back in, since then.

Sue remembers crying her heart out the night she left home. She remembers her mother trying to manipulate her by pretending to ignore her. At some point, she realised that she was a grown ass woman who is responsible for her own life and happiness. She thinks, ‘ _I couldn’t waste the rest of my life trying to meet her standards. It’s like signing up to a life of shrivelling up and dying really slowly over eighty years_.’ When she walked out of the mansion she could see her mother glaring at her from the window. A part of Sue wanted her mother to look into her eyes and truly see her for the first time in her life. Sue wanted her mother to finally understand her on a fundamental level, but it never happened. Her mother assumed that Sue left home to rebel, but Sue left to find things that can't be bought.

A sense of purpose. A sense of self. An actual emotional connection.

Sue doesn’t need or want elaborate and expensive gifts. She loves the sweet, little things Ralph does for her on a regular basis. Sue reaches over to Ralph and kisses him on the cheek.  He smiles at her as she places her head on his shoulder for a bit. They drive in silence for fifty minutes, until he spots a gas station. He stops the car at the gas station to fill up on fuel and take a break. They step outside and he looks at his second-hand car with disappointment.

 **Ralph:** It’s just that sometimes I feel bad, you know?

 **Sue:** But why, donut? 

 **Ralph:** Because I can't buy you expensive gifts or take you on nice dates to fancy restaurants or throw diamonds at you. 

 **Sue:** First of all, diamonds are overpriced and overrated pieces of compressed carbon. Nothing special about them. Diamond rings are just the basic bitches of engagement rings, I want something more unique. Second of all back when I was a socialite it felt like every one of my boyfriends was trying to buy their way into my heart. It's like, “Hey if I insert gift and flattery tokens, then I will get sex and love tokens in return”. That’s not how relationships should work. Third of all, you have the highest number of boyfriend points out of all the past boyfriends, just so you know…

 **Ralph:** Boyfriend points?

 **Sue:** Well, you have an actual personality, so that’s like 1000 points already. 

 **Ralph:** Okay… 

 **Sue:** You’re really funny so that’s 2000 points. You are kind, brave and caring so that’s 6000 points. Let us not forget the sexiness points, which brings the total to 20000. How many people can say that they are dating the best superhero ever? ( _Points to herself_ ) Wait, it’s just me, so that’s like a trillion more points. Aaaaaand—you’re awesome, which gives you an infinite number of points.

 **Ralph:** You know, **( _Wiggles his nose_ )** this sounds like a totally bullshit scoring system! I think you just made that stuff up to make me feel better. 

 **Sue:** Okay, so I may have made that part up. **( _Smiles_ )** But I like you the best and that’s not made up, at all.

She stands on her toes, wraps her arms around his shoulder and kisses him. He smiles and stretches his arms around her waist. They spend the rest of the road trip singing along to the radio while Ralph shapeshifts into the singers. At one point, he becomes a cross between Britney Spears and Elton John and they both end up laughing for ages. Sometimes they sing the actual lyrics. Most of the times they just make up a dumber and weirder version of the actual lyrics. They turn **_Bohemian Rhapsody_** into a song about Santa Claus screwing up the time line and fighting the Gorilla Illuminati. Eventually, Sue falls asleep in her seat and Ralph notices that she’s shivering. He drapes his trench coat over her and kisses her forehead, as they approach Coast City. He may not be able to take her to a five-star restaurant but he can take her to the best Pizza Place in the world and that’s good enough.

* * *

**Panels for your reference:**

https://imgur.com/a/svAzxv3

This adorable and corny panel where Ralph comes up with a bullshit saying to reassure Sue is just one of the many sweetest moments between the two of them from the comics. 

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I always loved the Green Lantern lore and the show has all these cute little easter eggs for Green Lantern. It's unlikely that they will do any Green Lantern stuff because of budget, so I wanted to weave that into my story and it will become important later on. Billy's Joel's Uptown Girl really reminds me of Ralph and Sue's relationship. In the comics she comes from a very rich family and she basically marries down. I wanted to flesh out that part of her back story. When I started writing Sue's character I asked myself what drives her character. After leading a lonely life as a socialite and being alone for five years after she got her powers, she has a really strong desire to connect with people. That's why she is driven to understand people as a therapist and protect them as a cop. 
> 
> The contrast in class between Ralph and Sue, creates insecurities within Ralph who has spent five years of his life being broke and at times he'll wonder what does he really have to offer to Sue. He gives Sue something she craves more than anything, which is an actual emotional connection. As for Mrs. Dearbon, I will eventually introduce Ralph and Sue's parents. A person's relationship with their parents has a huge impact on future romantic relationships. People fall into a tendency or trap to glean something from their significant others that they didn't get from their parents. In Ralph's case it would be the attention and affirmation that he didn't get from his own father and in Sue's case, it would the warmth and affection she couldn't get more her own mother.


	21. Deep dark secrets

The Star Labs hallways were infamous for being **_the_** **_place_** for pep talks, but now it has been turned into the place where Ralph and Sue engage in their ‘secret’ flirting. They have been canoodling in the hallways for almost a year at this point. Ralph’s arm is stretched around Sue’s waist. He recounts the time he got wasted in Vegas and met Wonder Woman. 

 **Sue:** Wait a minute, you actually took photos of the time you got wasted in Vegas? Can I see them?

 **Ralph:** No.

 **Sue:** C’mon drunk Dibny is comedy gold. You make these really ridiculous faces, especially when you’re drunk. In fact, I kinda turned it into a game. See! 

Sue shows Ralph her phone and starts scrolling through all of the ridiculous photos she took of Ralph.

 **Ralph:** No. I’m not going to do it.

 **Sue:** Okay, I promise that I won’t laugh. 

 **Ralph:** No.

 **Sue:** I promise I won't laugh, **_that much_**.

 **Ralph:** No.

 **Sue:** Pleeeeeeeease?

 **Ralph:** **( _Shakes his head_ )** NO! NO! Nopity! Nope! Nope! I know what you’re tryin’do here. You see, I finally figured out your deep dark secret, Sue. You had another secret super power ever since you were a baby. 

 **Sue:** Oh yeah, what’s that?

 **Ralph: _(Squints his eyes in suspicion)_** Being really cute all the time. I mean, it's just not humanly possible for someone to be **_this_** adorable. The biggest is clue is the fact that your snoot is too damn cute! It’s a shame though, because you have been using for adorableness for evil things. Like stealing my heart and pushing me to reveal embarrassing photos of myself. **( _Speaks in an overly serious tone_ )** I think, everyone needs to know the truth about you.

Sue stands up on her toes and wraps her arms around his shoulder. She leans in closer and smiles mischievously.

 **Sue:** Well then, I will just tell everyone your deep dark secret. 

 **Ralph:** **( _Raises an eyebrow_ )** Oh yeah, and what’s that? 

 **Sue:** You’re obviously a Greek God in disguise. **_(Strokes his chest)_** I mean, you’re definitively built like one and you just happen to have a suspiciously perfect jawline. **_(Softly nibbles on his jaw)_** I’ll just have to spill the beans on you, if you spill the beans one me.

 **Ralph:** You blackmailing diabolical mastermind! 

 **Sue:** **( _Smiles cheekily_ )** Yup, I was secretly evil the whole time. I’m probably going to take over the world tomorrow.

 **Ralph:** Well, I got my eye on you.

He slowly slips his hands in the back pockets of her jeans and grabs her hips.

 **Sue:** **( _Bites her lip_ )** Ralph, c’mon, we both know where your eye _really_ is.

They burst out laughing and end up kissing each other for a while.

 Meanwhile in the cortex, Cisco is watching everything on the monitors and wondering why he has to suffer so much. He may have shipped them from the start, but he didn't expect this level of PDA. Hartley is quietly eating popcorn as he glances at the screens nonchalantly. He should be working on the anti-time wraith tech but it is taking an eternity to load things. More importantly he secretly enjoys watching Cisco being awkwardly uncomfortable with Ralph and Sue’s diabetes inducing, sugar coated flirting.

 **Cisco** : Dude, what the hell?

 **Hartley:** What? I’m bored. And really hungry. Plus, Plastic Guy is kinda cute.

 **Cisco** : His name is Elongated Man. 

 **Hartley:** And he wears a tight leather suit with **_that_** name?

Cisco cringes internally and Hartley chortles diabolically.

He thinks, ‘ _Oh Cisco, this is just the beginning. I may be a good guy now, but I will get payback for all of the times you called me a dick and stole my strawberry jello. I will get my revenge by—enjoying and magnifying your awkwardness! Holy shit. Maybe I should get a life. Or sign up for Grindr. Whatever works.’_  

 **Hartley:** Do they know that we can see them?

 **Cisco:** **_(Speaks in a high pitched angry voice)_** They know. They have to know _! ( **Yells from the inside of the cortex)**_ You know I can see you right? I see y’all. Your secret flirting isn’t very secret!

 **Ralph:** **_(Yells back)_** Who cares, sex cube boy!

Cisco’s face turns red as he shuts up and Hartley is laughing his ass off at Cisco’s response.

 **Hartley:** What’s a sex cube? Where can I get one? **_(Smirks)_** Can you make me one, Cisco?

 **Cisco:** NO! JUST NO! 

Ralph and Sue keep kissing each other, but after some time they pull back and panic for a moment. The idea of the other person knowing their **_real_** deep dark secrets is utterly horrifying to both of them.

He thinks _, ‘She’ll hate me when she finds out about all the crappy things I did back when I was a selfish dick.’_

She thinks _, ‘He’ll leave me when he finds out that my powers can drive me and everyone around me insane_.’

They both sense each other’s fear due to the empathic bond and wonder why the other person is so sacred of being loathed and left behind.

He strokes her hair thinks, ‘ _God, I love this woman.’_

She strokes his cheek and thinks, ‘ _God, I love this man._ ’

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Author's note: Ralph and Sue are still in the honeymoon phase of their relationship where they're being adoable together and really flirty, but at some point in every relationship that phase ends. It's what happens after that which determines if a relationship will last, because after that point you have deal with the other person's emotional baggage and flaws without that honeymoon high. All I am saying is that, shit is about to get personal.


	22. Homeward Bound

Ralph is hanging out at Sue’s apartment on a lazy Sunday afternoon. She is absent-mindedly strumming a familiar song, which brings back fond but painful memories back for Ralph. 

 **Ralph:** I didn't know that you played the guitar.

 **Sue:** **( _Presses her cheeks with both of her palms_ )** Oh, my god! I have actual hobbies! Well, playing music is very cathartic for me, it helps me control my emotions and powers.

 **Ralph** : Hmmm….

 **Sue:** C’mon, I mean, I didn't know you were a huge country music fan of all things.

 **Ralph** : I’m not…not, really. 

 **Sue:** You know that CD you keep playing over and over again, when we drive together? I know that it's scratched by now, so I got all of Izzy’s Bowin’s songs and put it on this iPod. 

She gives Ralph the iPod and the iPod cover has the cover art for Izzy’s first album.

 **Ralph:** Oh… **( _Starts tearing up_ )** Thank you. 

Sue eyes glow and she immediately sense Ralph’s grief. She puts her guitar down and gently pulls Ralph towards her. He places his head on her chest. 

 **Sue:** C’mere. **_(Speaks softly)_** You were close to her, weren’t you?

 **Ralph:** Yeah. We were both being hunted by Devoe at the time and even though we didn't know each other for that long, I got really attached to her. Then…and then I had to watch Devoe murder her in front of me and take over her body. ( _Starts crying_ ) I knew it wasn’t her, but when I heard Devoe talking to me in her body and….in…in her voice I just wanted to believe for five minutes that it was actually her. You know, sometimes, I keep…I keep replaying that moment my head over and over again. I always remember how she was frozen in fear and I told her to look at me. I promised to protect her and I…I… 

 **Sue:** It's okay Ralph. **( _Kisses his forehead_ )** I got you.

Ralph breaks down crying, his face starts to fall apart and Sue just holds him while stroking his hair. After a good cry, drinking five cups of hot chocolate and gobbling up fifty cookies, Ralph finally calms down.

 **Ralph:** I guess I saw myself in her. I know what it's like to have your entire family turn their backs on you. Hell, after I committed perjury my father wouldn't even look at me. I know what it's like to leave your family and hometown behind to pursue your dreams. You know, I left Waymore and came here to make a name for myself as a detective. 

 **Sue:** Why didn't you become a detective at Waymore? 

 **Ralph:** Well, I wanted to escape— **( _whispers dramatically_ )** the curse of Ken! He’s a diabolical demon who slowly sucks away your life force and steals your dreams. **( _Chuckles_ )** Nah, he’s my older brother and he’s actually a nice guy. **( _Sighs in frustration_ )** It’s just, really annoying being compared to him all the time. It’s always Ken is a prodigy. Or Ken won a gold medal at Olympics. **( _Does jazz hands_ )** Or, Ken got into Harvard at 15! Why can't _you_ get into Harvard—like ever?

 **Sue:** Eh…I have been there, done that. Harvard is overrated. I hated dealing with all those snobby elitists who thought they were better than everyone else, because they got in. 

 **Ralph:** I know that this sound kind of stupid, but after I save people I kind of go back every few months to check on them. You know to make sure they are still there. When I spot them, I give them a thumbs-up and then they give me a thumbs-up and then I know that everything is okay. 

 **Sue:** That’s not stupid. **( _Smiles lovingly_ )** Of course, you would do that, because you **( _Boops his nose_ ) **are a sweet little donut.

Ralph presses the play button on the iPod and they both listen to Izzy’s music. 

 **Sue:** By the way, what’s your favorite song of Izzy’s?

 **Ralph: _Somethin’ Bad_**. I mean it’s the first sing I heard her play.

 **Sue:** Personally, I like her cover of **_Simon and Garfunkel’s Homeward Bound_**. You know what, maybe I will play at the Open Mic Night. I mean, you’ll come to see me, right?

 **Ralph:** **( _Kisses Sue_ )** Hell yeah, I will. 

 

 ** _A week later_**  

Ralph basically drags Barry, Cisco and Joe to the Open Mic Night at Jitters. Cisco thinks, ‘ _At least it’s more sanitary than a strip club_.’ The moment Sue starts coming on stage, Ralph starts cheering loudly.

 **Ralph:** Woooo! **( _Starts clapping his hands_ )** Oh yeah! **( _Claps his hands really loudly and enthusiastically)_** WOOOOOOO!

He looks at Sue with pride and gives her a thumbs-up. She smiles back and blows him a kiss. He pretends to catch her kiss and puts it inside the imaginary pocket next to his heart. 

As Sue plays and sings **_Homeward Bound,_** Ralph remembers all of the crazy pranks he pulled in Waymore. Back when his father was still around, he’d come back after a long day at work, telling him his ‘cop stories’. He remembers roughhousing with Ken and sneaking off to play video games together. Ralph has tried to make amends over the years, but he was either pushed away by his family or if they did pay attention to him, he ended up lashing out at them like an asshole. He doesn't know how to fix things at this point. He thinks, ‘ _If dad is somehow managing to reconcile with mom after he ditched us, maybe I have a shot_.’

Ralph knows that his family will love Sue if they met her. His father would ask her for her ‘cop stories’, his mother would pinch her cheeks and his brother would ask him, _“How the hell did you even end up with her?”_ A part of him wants to go home—but it’s all too painful: the rejection, the constant feeling of alienation, the way their overwhelming resentment slowly simmers, the gut-wrenchingly awkward family dinners, the disappointment over life choices, and all of the dangling conversations begging to be spoken by their stifled voices.

Ralph softly and solemnly _sings to himself,_ as he replays old memories with his family in his mind.

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Some people may see Ralph getting attached to Izzy because he has a silly little crush on her, but on a re-watch I realized that Izzy was a microcosm for Ralph's life. They both had to struggle in life and they were abandonned by parental figures. Then got their powers and their lives imporved drastically. All of that was at stake because of some asshole in a floating chair. So in my version of the story Ralph sees Izzy as a kindred spirit who he failed to save. Ralph's relationship with Izzy and the whole bus meta saga is something that will haunt him. I know the show implies that Ralph is an only child, but in the comics Ralph has a brother who is basically the golden boy of Waymore. I decided to keep him, because Ken and Ralph can have a really interesting dynamic in the story. I will explore Ralph's relationship with Ken, his estranged dad and mom later on.


	23. Last Week’s Alcohol

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Warning: This is not a fun piece of fluff. The chapter delas with darker themes which may trigger people, such as depression.

After spending five years of his life rotting away in a rut, there are times when Ralph looks at his current life and wonders how he even ended up here. He’d never imagined that he’d become a superhero or a respected detective who solves actual crimes or a man a who ends up with someone like Sue. Nowadays he tries to avoid thinking about his past. Ralph Dibny, Private Dick is a complete stranger to Ralph Dibny, Ductile Detective. The problem is that he feels as though there are entire chunks of his life missing. His life story for those five years is a jumbled mess. It's like all the days just blended together a hideous and bland shade of beige. He doesn’t know if he can't remember things because his brain wants to suppress those awful memories or because he was too drunk most of the time. He does remember specific moments where he found himself, drowning in pain, bitterness, fear, shame and self-loathing. But most of the times he felt absolutely nothing. He felt completely numb. He would just drift past people, not feeling attached to anyone. He remembers thinking, ‘ _Lady I ain’t got time for your sob story. Jeez, just pay up and leave. I need to buy more booze_.’ He looked at betrayed women weeping and betrayed men screaming, unable to empathize with their pain. Feeling pain was like doing laundry, it was kinda inconvenient. Thankfully there’s Gingold for that.

Being drunk for a couple of hours meant not feeling the guilt of hurting and conning innocent people to make ends meet. Being drunk for a few days meant glossing over all the women’s hearts he had broken. Being drunk for a few weeks, meant not dealing with the fact that he went from being a beloved cop to a detestable asshole. Being drunk for a few months, meant not dealing the crippling loneliness of being abandoned by his entire family and friend circle. Being drunk for five years, meant not confronting the utterly horrifying possibility that he had ruined his own life. 

Sometimes he had these weird out of body moments, where he’d look at himself —just falling. Falling into a bathtub of vodka and rum. Or maybe that actually happened. He remembers waking up in a bathtub of crushed beer cans after fighting with his brother.

Ralph can't remember the number of times he blamed the brandy for his shitty decisions.

Forgot to pay back a loan from a friend? Swore to help someone for free, only to back out? Abandoned a one night stand after promising to stay? Made a promised and didn't follow through in general? Blame the booze! Drunk Douchebag Dibny became the new Bartholomew Henry Allen for Ralph. Ralph just blamed him for everything. As much as he “enjoyed” getting wasted and clubbing night after night or eating chicken wings off of stripper’s bellies, he always hated the morning after. It was the same thing over and over again—throwing up over the toilet seat and feeling completely empty afterwards. It just seemed like he like was just throwing up last nights’ dinner, but it felt like he was throwing up his entire life. Even though Ralph doesn't remember most of the times he got drunk, he remembers the worst incident. He idiotically decided to drive back after a crazy bender and crashed into the entrance to CCPD. However, just before he crashed he remembers thinking, ‘ _God I hope I don't wake up in a hospital. Maybe I won’t wake up at all_. _That’d be nice_ ’ Ralph tries to stop his mind from wandering and fixating on the past.

He and Sue are heading to the newly opened, Rathaway Institute. 

In some ways, Hartley knows what it’s like to depend on alcohol to get by. He remembers getting completely wasted for the first time in his life, after realizing that he was a meta. But then again, it was the lowest point in his life. He had been rejected by his family for being gay. The only mentor figure and father figure in his life betrayed and abandoned him. On top of that he had to deal with this constant pain in his ear, this constant agonizing screeching. It felt like the world was screaming at him, constantly criticizing and attacking him.

Hartley thinks, ‘ _Yeah, cosplaying as douchy Harry Potter and attacking other people was not the best way to cope. In hindsight, being that pipeline gave me the time to think about things._ ’ He laughs to himself when he remembers all the times Cisco ate his strawberry jello, in order to spite him, but then again Hartley was kind of a dick at the time. Months of therapy finally allowed him to deal with his feelings of loneliness and bitterness towards the world. Eventually his parents started missing him and they tried to make amends. It worked, because he didn't lash out at them like an asshole. For the first time in his life, he felt like he was having a real conversation with his parents and they finally understood him on a fundamental level. Now, they are constantly trying to set him up with other men. 

Hartley realizes that he was lucky enough to find a therapist who was willing to treat a meta but not everyone has that luxury. Even though he dons the gloves and costume from time to time to engage in some vigilante activity, he has mostly spent the last few years of his life trying to start a counselling center for meta-humans. He can’t wait to meet Ralph and Sue, so he can start helping the all of the metas who were experimented on. 

 **Hartley:** Hey! **( _Shakes Sue’s hand_ )** Thanks so much for dropping by and helping me out.

 **Sue:** **( _Smiles_ )** No problem! You're doing good work here. God, I wish there was something like this back when I got my powers. 

 **Hartley:** Oh yeah, you're a meta! I keep forgetting that. So, what can you do?

 **Sue:** I’m an empath.

 **Ralph** : She’s basically a psychic mind ninja. 

 **Hartley:** Cool. **( _Smiles giddily_ )** Actually, there is this really cute Neurophysicist who works here and he’s also an empath. You should totally meet him.

Sue goes in to meet the other metas, scientists and therapists there, while Hartley quickly sneaks over to Ralph. 

 **Hartley: ( _Whispers)_** Did you get it?

 **Ralph** : **( _Winks_ )** Well, a promise made is a promise kept. 

Ralph smiles at him and hands over something wrapped in mauve wrapping paper. Hartley rips off the wrapping paper and almost cries tears of joy. It is an autographed photo of Hartley smiling like a dork and Ralph doing his classic thumbs-up pose in his Elongated Man costume. It is signed, ‘ _You can't escape the long arm of the law! Sincerely, the Ductile Detective: Elongated Man._ ’ Ralph walks past a woman and he swears he remembers seeing her somewhere. He wraps his arms around Sue and kisses her cheek. Peter is initially shy and nervous when he meets Sue, but he gets really excited when he learns that she is an empath like him. Ralph happily hugs Adam, who after being rescued from Persephone Eiling’s lab was finally dealing with his trauma through art therapy.

The woman thinks, ‘ _Oh god, it **is** him._’

 **Woman** : **( _Screams_ )** You, asshole! 

 **Ralph** : Who? Me?

 **Woman** You abandoned me! You left me after you promised that you would stay. 

 **Ralph** : What? 

 **Woman** **( _Cries_ ) **I begged for help and you just left me! How could you do something like that?

 

She spits at Ralph’s face and starts screaming. Her entire body becomes charged with electricity and she lunges towards him in rage. Sue’s eyes glow blue and she uses her powers to sedate the woman. She leaves the building with Ralph, after Hartley apologizes for Sarah’s outburst. Once they get back home, Sue finally decides to confront him. 

 **Sue:** What happened there, Ralph? Do you know her?

The color slowly drains from Ralph’s face the moment he remembers what happened with Sarah. He hides his face in in shame and Sue places her hand on his shoulder.

 **Sue:** Ralph?

 **Ralph** : I remember her. **( _His legs start wobbling_ )** It was a few weeks after the particle accelerator explosion. I met her at a club, we slept together. She asked me to stay over and I was planning to leave once she fell asleep. She started shooting electricity out of her body and I panicked. Looking back, I think she lost control of her powers. She cried and screamed for help and I…I… left her. She messaged me many times, asking for help and I blocked her.

The memory becomes more horrifying for Ralph once he realizes that Sarah was one of the metas who was sold off by Amunet Black and used as a human generator for five years.  

 **Ralph** : _**(Cries**_ **)** Oh god. I’m a horrible human person!

 **Sue:** Ralph, you didn’t know—

 **Ralph** : NO! I…I could have saved her! I could have helped her! But I didn't because I was a PIECE OF SHIT! 

He smacks his forehead and starts pulling his hair in frustration. Sue can sense the intense self-loathing, shame and regret radiating off of Ralph. 

 **Ralph:** **( _Speaks angrily_ )** You know, I look at the man that I use to be and I can’t stand him! How the hell did I let myself sink so low? **( _Looks at his reflection in horror_ )** After all of the shitty things I did, how can tell myself that I am good person?

 **Sue:** Hey! Stop beating yourself up like that. You went from being self-centered P.I. to a being a superhero. I can tell you as a former therapist that it is rare to see someone make that much positive progress so quickly. You changed more in a year than most people do a decade. You should be proud of that. 

 **Ralph:** Sue, you don't know what I was like back then. I was a selfish, sleazy, entitled, greedy and deceptive asshole. I treated women like crap. I just saw them as measurements and potential sexcapades. **( _Laughs bitterly_ )** I **_really_** don't deserve someone like you. There are so many people that I ditched, snitched on, exploited, manipulated and conned. I mean, was I just drunk the whole time? Wait a minute… I was actually drunk most of the time. No, No, NO! That’s just an excuse!

 **Sue:** Ralph, why didn't you share that part of your past with me? 

 **Ralph:** I promise you that you will never have to deal with Drunk Douchebag Dibny. You deserve nothing but the best and I’ll go through hell to give you that. I just don't want you to see that part of me, okay? 

 **Sue:** Why?

 **Ralph: _(Looks at his feet and speaks inaudibly)_ ** I don't know, I guess you’ll disappointed and ashamed of me. You'd probably end up hating me. 

Sue’s eyes fill up tears as she shakes her head.

 **Sue:** No. No. I don’t hate you… Did you really believe that I would think less of the amazing man you are right now because of your crappy past? I am not trying to justify your behavior, here. You probably did do a lot of selfish and shitty things after you lost your job, but you poured your heart, your soul and yourself into being a detective. Once you were kicked off the force, you lost a huge part of your identity. It seems to me that you spiraled into deep depression and you had no family or friends to support you. I can't imagine how much you struggled alone during that time. 

 **Ralph:** **( _Smiles sadly_ )** Sue, you're just making that stuff up to make me feel better.

 **Sue:** I’m going to let you in on a little “empath secret” here. There are so many times, I look at seemingly happy and goofy people only to sense their suppressed pain and fear. I meet paragons of virtue, but I can sense their intense self-loathing and guilt over past mistakes and awful choices. Everyone has a past. Everyone has baggage. You’re screwed up! I’m screwed up! **( _Points out the window_ )** That guy over there is screwed up! But we’re all just trying to be happy at end of day and maybe we can turn people who we can be proud of when our lives end.

She presses her nose against his nose and makes a ‘boop’ sound.

 **Sue: _(Speaks softly_** _)_ When I look at you, I just see a good man who is trying his best to deal with his flaws and fears. Ralph, I want you to share this part of yourself with me. I want to know about your past. I want to understand you.

 **Ralph** : **( _Whispers)_** But, why?

She lovingly strokes his cheek and kisses his forehead.

 **Sue: ( _Smiles_ )** Because, you're my sweet little dorky donut and I love you.

Ralph is completely taken aback by the idea that the beautiful and amazing woman in front of him actually loves and accepts him. He wraps his arms around her and starts kissing every inch of her with joy. He knows he’s not perfect, but he will try to give her the best version of himself.

* * *

**The beautiful song that partially inspired the chapter:**

**Also, Andy Mientus is a gem.**

  

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I am surprised that a lot of people who watch the show miss the subtext and the short hand of the show implying that Ralph was a depressed man who used alcohol to cope with things during the five years after he lost his job. Since Ralph is such a jovial character who constantly cracks jokes, some of the more tragic things about him are concealed. Think about it, the guy thought he was doing the right thing and then he lost everything. His job, his friends, his reputation and even his family ditched him. Even though he had a great arc on the show, the writers still need to work on striking that balance between comedy and pathos with him. I don't know if the show will explore his past in more depth or not. However, I really wanted to explore the phase of his life where he turned into a hedonistic, selfish and self-destructive person after he lost a part of himself. In True Colors we see Ralph getting drunk after he thinks that he failed Team Flash and that everyone will leave him. That's when I thought, I could look at how Ralph used alcohol numb his emotions and dettach from people, so he doesn't have to deal with his painful and messy emotions. I think if Season 4 epsiode 23 version of Ralph met his past self he would feel a bit of disgust and self-loathing. 
> 
> Sue is the voice of compassion and empathy here. Partially because being an empath has given her a better understanding of the human experience but also because she has own baggage (which I will explore soon....). With Ralph's self loathing and abandonment issues, the idea of Sue actually loving and accepting him is ludicrous to him. But he needs to see that someone will love him and accept him, even with a screwed up history and all the broken pieces. This is was one of my favourite chapters to write, becasue I got to dive into Ralph's mind and also because I cried like a baby for two minutes.


	24. Mini Slingshots

Ralph is use to people being grossed out and weirded out by his powers, but Sue Dearbon—simply did not give a shit. It didn't matter if his face is contorted like that painting from ‘It’ or if his jaw drops to the floor, she always grabs his butt and tells him that he is the “perfect ten”, every single time. Ralph remembers how utterly embarrassed he felt when he sneezed and his face fell apart, but she didn't look at him in disgust or throw up. He smiles when he remembers what she told him, her response was: _It’s okay, shit happens_. She kissed him on the forehead and helped him put his face back together. Sometimes, Ralph intentionally tries to twist and bend his body in odd ways to weird Sue out, but it always ends with her winking at him and blowing him a kiss.

She just accepts him in his weird stretchy glory.

Ever since then, Ralph is completely comfortable with using his powers in front of her. He elongates his arms and legs all the time when he does the chores or needs to grab the remote or even when he is in the bathroom. When he stretches his neck across the room to kiss her, here first thought isn’t: _Holy shit! There is this horrifying dangling head attached to this piece of fleshy rubber noodle thing_. It’s more along the lines of: _Holy shit! There is this handsome man in front of me and I have to kiss him!_ Hell, Sue comes up with batshit crazy ways of using his powers for dates and she is actually audacious enough to follow through on a lot of these ideas. Sometimes, Ralph stretches and ties his arms around Sue like a harness, and they go bungee jumping together. Sometimes they jump off of buildings and Ralph parachutes Sue down. Other times, they faff around the beach together and he stretches himself into a human hammock. She just lies on top of him and softly sings in his ear while stroking his hair. Of course, he uses his powers during more **“ _intimate”_** activities with Sue, but that’s more of a private inside joke between the two of them.

Ralph thinks, ‘ _What’s the point of having cool powers if you don’t use them to weird and stupid stuff with your girlfriend?’_

Ralph and Sue are hanging out with Barry and Iris at the West-Allen loft. Ralph lovingly watches his little Marry Poppins performing parkour in a desperate attempt to grab snacks from the top shelf. Sue may be a psychic mind ninja and a badass detective, but she is still a 5’2’’ woman with tiny hands who has to stand on her tippy toes to kiss Ralph. Ralph stretches his hand and grabs the snacks for her, he quickly elongates his neck and kisses Sue’s cheek. She smiles at him and kisses his wiggling nose. Sue finally gets off the kitchen table as Iris helps her bring the snacks over.

****

**Iris:** Aren't you weirded out…by you know?

 **Sue:** Oh, I got used to it. It doesn’t matter how he stretches himself, he looks handsome from any angle. 

 **Iris:** **( _Laughs_ )** Okay.

 **Sue:** **( _Smirks_ )** Plus he can stretch _certain_ parts of himself. Those flexible and stretchy rubber parts of his are incredibly useful _tools_ during—investigations. 

Sue winks at Ralph with a cheeky smile on her face and he snickers to himself.

 **Barry:** **( _Rolls his eyes_ )** Oh god, you’re like a bunch of teenagers. What…What are you writing? Wait a minute, did you tear that off from the report I sent you?

 **Ralph:** _Whaaaat_? It was long winded anyways and the last page had like two sentences printed on it, so I may as well use the extra paper for something important.

Ralph turns his fingers into a mini slingshot and flings the note at Sue. Sue catches it and raises both of her hands dramatically.

 **Sue: _(Whispers loudly)_** GOAL!

 

Sue opens up the note with a silly drawing of her and it states:

**_Dear Sue,_ **

**_I just had to send you this incredibly important message to you. This is a very vital piece of information that you definitely need to know. You just have to know that, you are my happy place. Screw Disneyland! You are the happiest place on earth and I hope that I eventually get life-time access._ **

**_Love Ralph._ **

**_P.S. I know that the drawing looks like a lady with a Dorito for head. It’s actually supposed to be you holding your hands up in the shape of a house, but I can't draw for shit._ ** ****

**_P.P.S. You're just too damn perfect and beautiful to draw. I think I’ll just stand here and enjoy the most spectacular view in the world AKA you (and also your fabulous butt)._ **

 

Ralph assumes that Sue throws away all of his dorky notes, but he doesn't know that she actually collects and stores all of them in a safe.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I noticed on the show how a lot of characters like Joe are grossed out by Ralph's powers. I thought that his goofy and bizzare powers would be a great metaphor for the weird and messy parts of a person. One of the best things about being in a loving relationship is that you find someone who accepts all the weird shit about you. I had the idea for this exchange even before I started this fic. It'd be neat if someone actually drew Ralph using his body as a hammock or harness when he is with Sue. I just think it would be adorable.


	25. The Burden of Empathy

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Warning: This chapter explores more mature themes like mental illness, abuse, etc.

Sue is making one of her many visits to The Rathaway Institute in order to use her powers to help heal the minds of all the metas who were experimented on. Every time Sue uses her powers, Peter looks at her in awe. He could only manipulate hope and enhance people’s sense of empathy and conscience, but she can tap into the entire spectrum. 

 **Peter:** **( _Speaks softly_ ) **I know this sound stupid but, I keep dreaming about this glowing blue parrot pterodactyl thing, you know?

 **Sue:** Me too! You know I also dream about other weird creatures. Like there is this yellow demon parasite thing or this gigantic orange snake. My favorite is the shinning indigo octopus who always wants a hug and the really friendly, completely chill, luminous green whale with wings.

 **Adam:** What the hell are you guys even talking about? Is this something, I should know about? 

 **Sue:** No, it's just weird stuff that we see in our dreams. 

 **Peter:** Maybe it’s a metaphor….

 **Sue:** For what?

 **Peter:** **( _Speaks softly_ )** I dunno.

Sue starts places her hand on Adam’s forehead and her eyes turn indigo as she starts healing his mind.

 **Peter:** This is so cool!

 **Sue:** Hmmm…

 **Peter:** I mean this is really advanced stuff, can you imagine what we could do if you could replicate this? 

 **Sue:** You know what, that would be kinda nice.

 **Peter:** We could a new way of treating mental illness! Then everyone will feel happy and loved. Maybe we can achieve world peace and then we can—

 **Hartley:** **( _Smiles at him_ )** Run off to Vegas on a crazy road trip together….

 **Peter:** **( _Smiles back_ )** You know, I wouldn't mind running off to Vegas with you.

 

Hartley always finds Peter’s boundless optimism and enthusiasm endearing. Yes, Peter is an incredibly shy and soft-spoken person, but once he opens up he really opens up. This one time, they got really drunk at Karaoke Night and they sang every song from Les Misérables together. Now they just burst into song together on a regular basis, everyone else at the institute gives them weird looks, but no one says anything because Hartley owns the place. Hartley could watch Peter adorably ramble on about anything. He just places both of his hands on his cheeks and just listens to Peter to spew his thoughts on quantum mechanics, neuroscience, psychology, musicals, empath stuff, his crazy ideas and his weird ass dreams. Hartley and Peter, spend the next few weeks studying Sue’s powers. There is one major bottleneck and it's the fact that is Sue avoids pushing the limits of her powers.

 

 **Peter:** I don't know, I still don't think you are pushing the true limits of your powers.

 **Sue:** No, I don't think it's a good idea to do that.

At this point, Sue’s hands start trembling and her forehead is drenched in sweat. 

 **Peter:** C’mon just push a little bit harder. **_(Smiles)_** You can do it!

Sue’s eyes glow a bloody shade of red and colours start radiating out from her hands.

 **Sue:** **( _Yells_ )** I SAID NO!

Peter completely freezes in fear and looks at her with a hurt expression on his face. Hartley places his hand on Peter’s shoulder to comfort him.

 **Hartley:** Hey, you okay? Maybe we should stop. 

 **Sue:** Look, I’m sorry…I just um **( _starts panting_ )** just… have to go.

 

Sue runs back home and starts having a panic attack. She falls to the ground and curls up in a ball. She desperately wants to call Ralph for comfort, but she didn’t want him to see her like this. Sue thinks, ‘ _Ralph sees you as this fun, sassy, sarcastic and cool lady. He will run the moment he sees a madwoman with emotional baggage the size of a small galaxy._ ’ Even though Sue has told Ralph about Charlie betraying her and the existence of her powers, she always leaves out the details. Saying, “He tried to drag me to Eiling” is just providing facts and an account of the events in her life. Going into the painful details of what happened means revealing the dark emotions and thoughts lurking in her messy mind.

She never told him about the five years of hell she went through after she got her powers and how she turned into a bipolar insomniac. In the first few months as an empath, she absorbed everyone’s emotions and it almost broke her mind. The only way for her to deal with things was to numb her emotions and suppress her powers. It's only when she realized that other metas were being experimented on did she chose to feel again, to care again. She finally found the strength to gain control over her powers, her emotions and her life. Even with all of her progress, Charlie’s betrayal still haunts her. Sue, ‘ _I can't believe that I actually wanted to marry that man.’_

 

**_Six years ago,_ **

Charlie and Sue have been fighting ever since Sue got her powers from the particle accelerator explosion. Sue desperately wants to see a therapist for her bipolar disorder, but Charlie wants to her to stay quiet. He just wants her to suck it up and get over it, because he is more interested in the military applications of her powers. He tries to guilt trip Sue multiple times to get her to go General Eiling’s base, but Sue stands her ground. Eventually, he gives up on the idea and starts acting like the perfect boyfriend, but Sue can sense his resentment and lack of love.

Since she didn't understand her powers completely, she didn't trust her hyperactive intuition…yet. Charlie takes Sue out to a really expensive restaurant, under the guise of proposing to her. Sue isn’t blind though because she notices Charlie slipping something into her drink. She discretely throws the drink away and rushes back home. He sneaks into their apartment and tries to take her by force. Sue tries to fight back, but Charlie is a more experienced fighter and the end of the day, he is the one who trained her. He pulls her by the hair when she tries to run and holds her hand behind as her back as he slams her against the desk.

 

 **Sue:** I’m not going to be a lab rat! I will kill you! I swear….

 **Charlie** : Sweetie, you're blowing things out of proportion. It’s not that bad. It's all in your head. They are just going to run a couple of tests on you. 

 **Sue:** No, they are going to use me and violate me! **( _Screams_ )** Get off me! Get your hands off me. 

Charlie starts taking out a syringe to tranquillize Sue.  

 **Sue:** **( _Cries_ )** No…Please…. don’t! P-please stop. How…how can you do this to me? Don’t you love me? 

Then something inside Sue breaks, she suddenly starts feeling all of her suppressed anger, resentment and pain. Charlie starts hallucinating that he is on fire but the hallucination is so vivid that he feels the pain of actually being burned alive. Sue transforms into a being of raw energy and rage.

 **Sue:** Why are you screaming sweetie? It's all in your head.

At this point, Sue resembles a flaming demon woman and she shoves her glowing claws inside Charlies head.

 

Sue stops replaying that memory in her mind, because that is the night she completely shattered her ex’s mind. She has tried to go back and fix him, but she needs to feel genuine compassion for the person that she is trying to heal. She feels so much anger, hatred and resentment towards Charlie, that she couldn’t heal his mind. In hindsight, it's no shock that Charlie attacked her like that. Their relationship may have started out amazingly but as time went by things got worse. He had a tendency to dismiss her emotions, minimize her pain and invalidate her perception of things. However, Sue was so blinded by her love for him at the time that she kept lowering her standards and justifying his behavior. He was meant to be her soulmate after all. The man she thought she would end up marrying someday.  

Ever since she left Central City, she avoided getting too attached to people. Trusting and loving someone whole heartedly seemed like a delusional fantasy to Sue, because at the back of her mind a tiny voice kept asking, ‘ _What if he is manipulating and using you?_ ’ It's only when she tracked down and rescued another victim of emotional abuse as a cop, that she told herself, ‘ _Screw that asshole! I am not going to give him the power to ruin my life.’_ She started mediating and training so she could finally gain control of her powers. Playing music provided her with a bit of catharsis and grounded her. She learned how to stabilize the flow of emotional energy and heal her own mind, but she never told another soul about this. Not even here own mother knows about what she went through. The last thing she needed was to have her judgmental mother dismissing her feelings as usual.

Sue tries to focus on more positive memories so she doesn't end up spirally emotionally. She thinks about how whenever Ralph is around her, she can sense his warmth, his love for her and his compassion for others radiating off his body. She smiles when she starts remembering how she met Ralph. At the time, Ralph was trying to soften Captain Singh up a bit, by giving him free donuts. When Singh rebuffed him, Ralph’s response was: _I guess, you, **donut** like me every much_. Everyone else was cringing and rolling their eyes, but Sue was giggling in the corner. She remembers bumping into him and gazing into his eyes for the first time. She could see this beautiful tapestry of colours in eyes and her intuition was telling that, she was looking at a good man. Of course, the first thing he ever told her was: _Hey there, you want a donut?_ She remembers bursting into laughter and everyone at the precinct was baffled by a usually aloof Detective Dearbon, turning into this bubbly and sweet woman. In her defense, Ralph just dropped the best pick-up line ever. What woman could possibly resist free cream-filled donuts?

 

Ralph quietly sneaks into her apartment after hearing about what happened at The Rathaway Institute. 

 **Ralph:** **( _Stretches his finger and presses Sue’s nose_ )** Boooooooooooop! **( _Speaks in a robotic voice)_** I need a status update.

 **Sue:** Don't touch me!

Ralph sits down next to Sue, and looks at her with concern.

 **Ralph:** Honey, what’s wrong? 

 **Sue:** You w-won't… understand.

 **Ralph** : I want to understand, Sue.

 

This is the point where Sue starts unravelling in front of Ralph and gives him a glimpse into her mind.

 **Sue:** **( _Starts ranting_ )** You don’t know how difficult it is to control my powers. I have to constantly control and monitor my emotions. If I don't do that I could end up driving everyone around me insane. It's emotionally exhausting being aware of people’s feelings and struggles all of the time! Every time I use my empathic healing, I’m just gambling with my own insanity because I soak up other people’s emotions and trauma when I try to heal their minds. It’s so easy for other people to tell me to push myself a bit more and believe in myself, because at the end of the day they are not the ones who have to worry about ending up in a mental asylum. I DO!

 **Ralph:** It’s okay Sue, just let it all out. Listen, they are your powers. If you don't want to do something and you don't feel comfortable, that’s okay.

 **Sue:** You know I haven't told anyone about this…but um…I almost drowned myself because of my powers.

 **Ralph** : What?

 **Sue:** I couldn't take it anymore. I was experiencing the pain and suffering of everyone in the city! I just shut down and stopped caring about people, because caring about people was driving me insane. I couldn’t sleep at night because I kept dreaming about other people’s painful memories. I mean, I still have trouble falling asleep at night sometimes… 

Sue expects him to tell her that it's no biggie. That it’s just a dream and it doesn't matter because it's all in her head. So, she’s genuinely shocked by Ralph’s response.

 **Ralph:** Oh god, that is awful. You probably felt like you were actually living through their painful memories. **( _Gently strokes her hair and speaks softly_ )** You really do carry the whole world with you, don't you Marry Poppins?

Sue is completely taken aback because the first time in her life she feels heard and understood.

 

 **Sue** : **( _Sighs_ )** I don’t know, it just doesn't matter how much control I have over my powers and emotions, it always feels like I’m dangling over the mouth of madness. I keep thinking,

“What if push myself too hard and snap? What if I lose my mind?” If I crash and burn, no one will catch me. 

 **Ralph:** I’ll catch you.

 **Sue:** **( _Laughs bitterly and tears up)_** You’re not going to stick around with after I’ve gone nuts.

Ralph’s eyes fill up tears as he shakes his head.

 **Ralph:** No…No…Sue, I love you. I’m not just going to abandon you when you fall apart. Whatever comes, I come will come through for you. **_Always_**. I will always take care. Come what may, I will stay with you. 

 **Sue:** Really?

 **Ralph:** **( _Kisses her hand_ )** A promise made is a promise kept.

Ralph tries to wrap his arms around her and she pulls away.

 **Sue** : You shouldn’t hug me. If you touch me too much you will feel my pain and soak up my emotions. 

 **Ralph:** It doesn't matter, because you need a hug. Maybe you should let me soak up some of your emotions. Let me be your sponge cake! **( _Squints his eyes_ )** Wait, that’s a terrible metaphor.

Sue bursts out laughing and kisses every inch of him. She lets her emotions flow through her body and for a short a moment he shares the burden of empathy with her. They stay up all night and talk.

She tells him everything. 

She tells him how her heart was shattered when she left home and how badly she wants to fix things with her mother. She tells him just how alone and scared she felt when got her powers and how she had to hide a huge part of herself for five years. She tells him about her love-hate relationship with her powers and how the possibility of driving people insane horrifies her. She tells him about how she is still struggling to cope with being experimented on by Persephone Eiling. She finally tells him about what happened with Charlie, in detail. 

He just holds her and listens patiently. After crying for hours, Sue snuggles up with Ralph and he wipes her tears away. 

 **Ralph:** It's okay, Sue. **( _Kisses her forehead_ )** I got you. 

He turns himself into a swing and cradles her in his arms. He swings back and forth until Sue falls asleep. Ralph encourages Sue to go The Rathaway Institute and finally see a therapist. She is nervous about her first appointment, but Ralph promises to come with her and help her get through it. Whenever Sue gets back home from her therapy sessions, Ralph smiles at her and greets her by contorting his fingers into a balloon animal of a whale with wings. Sue ends up giggling when he starts busting out the weird whale noises. Ralph finds it ridiculous that Sue actually believed that he would want her less because of her past. He loves and admires her even more, after learning about what she went through. When he looks at her, he sees a beautiful woman who has gone through so much shit in her life and yet, she chooses to be one of the most compassionate, understanding and bravest people in the world.

To him, she is still practically perfect in every way.  

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I have mixed feelings towards Identity Crisis. On the one hand, it had some compelling themes and really emotionally evocative imagery, BUT I absolutely HATE the way Sue and Ralph are treated, Sue especially. Her rape and death are used as a prop in the story to up the drama and make the story darker. What really pisses me off, is that the story doesn't explore how Sue deals with her trauma or how it affects Ralph and Sue as a couple. The focus is on Elongated Man's dead wife and not on Sue Dearbon Dibny, trauma survivor. That's the side I wanted to explore with my version of Sue because even though Identity crisis made this huge change to Sue's history, the comics didn't actually explore this side of Sue. 
> 
> I had been dropping hints about the true nature of her abilities but I wanted to look at how traumatic and psychologically exhausting powers like empathy or telepathy can be. There is a cliche in comics where one character says you can see your powers as a gift or a curse. In Sue's case, they are both a gift and a curse which creates a weird love-hate relationship with her powers. In a weird and twisted way, she gets exactly what she wants ( a deeper and more intimate understanding of humanity), but it is overwhelming and confusing sometimes. 
> 
> I can say from personal experience that being in an emotionally abusive relationship can make you question your feelings and perception of reality because these things are used as weapons by the abuser. Sue initially copes with all of this trauma at first by emotionally shutting down and isolating herself from humanity. She lost a part of her core and it's only when she starts seeing herself in other victims she feels the urge to gain control of her life and powers. The one thing I want to highlight is that it's not Ralph's job to save Sue from her past or her mind. Even if he can fight monsters, demons, and villains he can't completely save Sue from the monsters in her mind. Sue still has to do the work to heal herself, but she has someone who will love and support her wholeheartedly.
> 
> I kinda imagined Ralph and Sue as kindred spirits. They both lost a part of themselves, they were lonely for a while and they both had to rediscover parts of themselves. Sue had to learn how to embrace her emotions, her intuition, and desire to connect with others. While Ralph had to embrace his sense of compassion, courage, selflessness, and conscience again. After all of that, they find each other and they spend the rest of their lives doing weird shit together.


	26. An incredibly important PSA

Sue finds it easier to push the limits of her powers and take more risks because she knows that Ralph will be there to support her and take care of her. At the end of the day when she is emotionally and physically exhausted from healing people’s mind or engaging in empathic combat, Ralph is always there with his magical hugs and nose ‘boops’. He wraps himself around Sue like a stretchy human blanket and rubs his cheek against hers, while they binge watch old film noirs together. Ever since Sue opened up to Ralph about her struggles as empath, their empathic bond has gotten a lot stronger. He can sense all of her emotions, he can ground her when she starts losing control of her powers and he can prance into her dreams, whenever he feels like it. Or when he eats way too much guacamole ice-cream before bed. 

 **Ralph** : Sue, I have to ask you something…

 **Sue:** Are you going to ask me about the weird ass creatures in my dreams?

 **Ralph:** In our dreams, by the way, and yes, I was going to ask you about that.

 **Sue:** I don't know why they are there. They have been there since I got my powers.

 **Ralph:** Well they are scary as shit, especially the that parasitic yellow demon thing. Sheesh. I’m not a huge of the red bull-lion thingy with the giant fangs either.

 **Sue:** Which ones do you like then?

 **Ralph:** I like the friendly flying green whale with the angel wings.  Also love the blue parrot pterodactyl thing because it brings dead stars back to life. It’s really sweet that it starts showering us with stars, you know, when we are dancing on top of rainbows beside the flash mob of unicorns with roses between their teeth.

 **Sue:** **_(Chuckles)_** I like the indigo octopus. He gives the second-best hugs in the multiverse. 

 **Ralph:** Well, who gives the best hugs then?

 **Sue:** You do.

Sue hugs him and kisses his cheek. The oven starts beeping in the background and Ralph gets up to grab the hot chocolate and snacks.

 **Ralph:** Belgian hot chocolate for the sweetest person in the world, with the cute little marshmallows, of course. 

 **Sue:** You’re a cute little marshmallow.

Ralph kisses her and he smiles deviously, as he carries out his diabolical scheme. Sue is getting hyped up to watch Thin Man, but Ralph has other plans…. Suddenly **_Never Gonna Give You Up_** starts playing and Sue stares at the screen in bewilderment.

 **Sue:** The hell is this? 

 **Ralph** : Oh, it's an incredibly important PSA…. 

Sue’s eyes widen in anticipation when the title **Wasted in Vegas: A short film by Ralph** Dibny appears on screen.

 **Ralph** : **( _Sings_ )** IIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIII just wanna tell you how I’m feeling. Gotta make you understand! **( _Wiggles his hips_ )** Never gonna give you up. Never gonna let you down. Never gonna run around and desert you. Never gonna make you cry. Never gonna say goodbye. Never gonna tell a lie and hurt you.

What follows is a ridiculous and hilarious photo montage of Ralph getting completely wasted in Vegas. There are a couple of snaps with Ralph doing sexy poses which look more an ostrich on cocaine trying to do a complicated mating dance. Pictures of Ralph dancing look more a tone-deaf T. Rex trying to realize it's dreams of being a Russian ballerina. There is a sort of adorable but kinda horrifying photo Ralph’s eyes popping out and his tongue dropping down when he spots a chocolate cake. The highlight however is the photo of him, on his knees doing a dramatic ‘why me’ pose with his mouth wide open. His face is covered in chocolate and he is cradling a mud cake in his arms, like a man who just lost the love of his life.

Meanwhile, Sue has been crying tears of laughter and chortling hysterically for the last three minutes. As for Ralph, he feels like the happiest man alive for those three minutes because he is watching the woman he loves more than anything, laughing her beautiful heart out.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I got the idea for this snapshot when I was wacthing the Never Give You Up music video and thought to myself, "Hey, Rick Astley kinda looks like Ralph from the 1960's and 1970's comics." Let's face it, Ralph is the kind of dork who would take a meme song and sing it as a sincere declaration of love. Plus there is something sweet about Ralph making a fool of himself to cheer Sue up.
> 
> The photos are a reference to another fic I wrote a while back, Wasted in Vegas with Wonder Woman.
> 
> https://archiveofourown.org/works/14199366


	27. A minor plot hole

After an asshole with a dragon head burned Ralph’s beloved trench coat, Sue decided to surprise him with a little gift.

 **Sue:** I got you something.

She unwraps the package with a smile and reveals Ralph’s gift.

 **Sue:** Do you like it?

Ralph puts on his new dark purple trench coat and does his little happy dance.

 **Ralph:** Hell yeah, I do!

He leans in to kiss her, but he stops midway when he starts seeing a burst of beautiful colours in her eyes. 

 **Sue:** What’s wrong?

 **Ralph:** I don't know if I am high or if this is totally normal because we live in a weird ass city, but I swear that I saw these weird colorful flames when I looked into your eyes.

 **Sue:** Oh, I see that too, when I look at you. In fact, I saw the same colours in your eyes, when I first met you. 

 **Ralph:** **( _Cups her cheeks in his hand)_** Well then, I guess it’s a just a metaphor for how beautiful you are. _**(Kisses her forehead)**_ Seriously, it’s like looking at a magical rainbow.

 **Sue:** You’re a magical rainbow!

Sue kisses him, in this moment of pure bliss something dawns on Ralph.

 **Ralph** : Wait a minute, you’re an empath! 

 **Sue** : So…

 **Ralph:** You can sense emotions… which means that you knew how I felt you about the whole time, didn’t you?

Sue gasps dramatically and adorably squishes both of her palms against her cheeks.

 **Sue:** Oh, my god, I totally knew the whole time. ( ** _Whispers)_** What a plot twist! Ralph I don't need to use my powers to know how you felt about me. I have a pair of eyes and more than two functioning brain cells, of course I could tell. It was really obvious. Oh, yeah and Cisco wrote about how he was secretly shipping us on his blog.

 **Ralph:** God, I was panicking about how I was going to tell you that I loved you. I had like a 119-step plan and everything, but it would have taken forever so I just decided to wing it. Why didn't you say anything?

 **Sue** : Ralph, just because I can sense people’s emotions doesn't mean that I should force people to express or act on their emotions. Sometimes you have let things happen on their own. Plus, I think we both needed time. I needed time to trust you and feel safe with the idea of being in a relationship again. You needed the time to get comfortable with me and build your confidence. I didn't want a guy who beats himself up and puts me on a pedestal. I want an equal partner who will do weird and stupid stuff with me. 

 **Ralph:** Well, you’re pretty damn lucky that you bumped into a stretchy weirdo like me.  

 **Sue:** You know what I don't get? 

 **Ralph:** What? 

 **Sue: _(Playfully smacks him on the shoulder)_** How the hell could you not tell that I was into you, Detective Donut? I was flirting with you the whole time! 

 **Ralph:** Wait, what? You were flirting with me?

 **Sue:** Yes! I mean how could I not flirt with you? When you walked into CCPD for the first time I was wondering when the hell did we hire a male supermodel. For the love of Beebo, I told you that I wanted you to fight crime naked! But you shouldn't do that because it's illegal to flash people and also because you would probably overwhelm everyone’s brain with your dangerous levels of sexiness. 

 **Ralph:** In my defense, I entertained the theory that you were attracted to me, okay? It's just that you are this amazing, brave, beautiful, smart and witty woman. ( ** _Mumbles_** ) I just didn't think someone like you would be into… ** _me_** , you know?

 **Sue:** You know what’s really ridiculous?

 **Ralph:** What?

 **Sue:** Just how damn handsome you look in that trench coat! **( _Wolf whistles_ )** C’mon show it off!

Ralph does a silly little cat-walk. He elongates his legs as he prances to one side of the room, then he twirls around dramatically before doing one his sexy poses.

 **Sue:** Now, could you repeat that in nothing **_but_** the trench coat?

She winks at him with a mischievously smile on her face. Ralph happily stretches out of his clothes, as Sue pounces on him and starts kissing his neck.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Since I read Formerly known as the justice league and some of the older JLA comics I noticed that there is a recurring joke that Sue is way out of Ralph's league. I thought I could tie that into Ralph's self esteem issues. When Cisco asks Ralph why he didn't hit on Nora, he answers "She's way too smart for me." I could see a similar scene happening with Sue if she were introduced on the show. 
> 
> I wouldn't be surprised if he didn't have some sort of body image issues after he let himself go. One of the things I didn't enjoy about Westallen is that fact that Iris was utterly oblivious to Barry's feelings even though she's a very intuitive character. Sue knew the whole time about how Ralph felt not only because her powers but also of her background as a therapist.


	28. An incredibly important question

Ralph has finally managed to make enough money to get a better office and rent a nice cozy apartment with Sue. He kisses her hand as they enter the building. Sue is humming to herself as she paints the sign on Ralph’s office door. It reads: **_Ralph Dibny, The Ductile Detective: Elongated Man_**. Ralph smiles when he spots her daydreaming and doodling tiny hearts on the door with a marker. He stretches his neck over and rubs his cheek against Sue’s.

 **Ralph:** Oh no! You're already vandalizing my door. It took a few months before for one my totally mature and pissed off clients decided to cross off Private Investigator and write Private Dick on the door.

 **Sue:** **_(Squints her eyes)_** Private Dick? That sounds like the same of sentient schlong that decided to join the army.

They both burst into laughter and spend the next forty minutes coming up with a tragic backstory for Private Dick, while they set up Ralph’s office. At some point, they even come up with a story how he eventually becomes a superhero detective who solves all of the “hard” cases. After Sue color-codes every file in Ralph’s office and he lovingly teases her for it, they finally start setting up their new home together. Even though Ralph’s elongated arms are speeding up the process, it doesn’t help that he is distracted by Sue bending over to pick up things and arching her back when she stands on her tippy toes to reach for something. By end of the day Ralph is washing the dishes and Sue is setting up their bedroom. This is the point where he wishes he had Barry’s super-speed so he could finish his chores and go straight to sleeping with Sue.

 **Ralph: _(Stretches his neck across the room)_** Beep. Boop. Beep. Boop. Beep. BOOOOOOP! **( _Speaks in a robotic voice)_** I have travelled though, all of time and space to meet you.

 **Sue:** Sweetie, you just stretched your neck across rooms. 

 **Ralph: _(Speaks in a robotic voice)_** I have come to earth for an important mission. 

 **Sue:** That sounds very interesting…what is this super-duper important mission?

 **Ralph: _(Speaks in a deep booming voice)_** TO KISS YOU!

 **Sue:** Kiss me?

She starts giggling when Ralph starts planting kisses all over her face and nibbling her ear.

 **Sue:** **_(Bites her lip)_** Do I finally get to meet the original, Private Dick?

 **Ralph:** Yup. He’s very excited to meet you. You know, since he has been checking out your fabulous butt and ridiculously sexy back for an entire day. 

 **Sue:** Then come inside, silly. 

 **Ralph: _(Winks)_** Oh, I will.

Ralph stretches into the room and picks up Sue up. He starts kissing her and she wraps he legs around his waist as they close the door behind them. After an elongated night, the sun finally shines on both of their bare bodies and Ralph wakes up first. He still gets genuinely surprised whenever he finds Sue’s head resting on his chest. For more than five years he got use to waking up alone and longingly staring at the other side of his bed. Ralph lovingly strokes her hair and tucks it behind her ear. He carefully caresses her eyelashes and removes the rheum from her eyes. He gently wipes the tiny bit drool near her bottom lip, with his thumb and kisses her forehead.

Ralph traces her curves with his elongated fingertips, enjoying the sight in front of him. He panics for a moment when he spots the old stab wounds on her stomach, bullet wounds on her shoulders and the faint burn marks on the back of her legs. Sue has a habit of joking about how many times she gets shot and how she’s jealous of Ralph’s ability to deflect bullets just by existing. As he lovingly gazes at his completely naked and absolutely beautiful other-half it dawns on him how fragile everything is. He thinks, ‘ _Shit_. _She doesn't have super-healing. She isn't indestructible silly putty. Holy shit, there are so many things that can kill her_. _What if she gets hurt? What if I lose her?_ ’ He gets distracted when Sue softly nibbles on his chest while making ‘nom nom nom’ sounds. 

 **Sue:** **_(Yawns)_** Good morning, Elongated Man. You really lived up to name last night **_(Giggles)_**. Oh no. What have you done?

 **Ralph:** **_(Panics)_** Oh my god! What's wrong?!

 **Sue:** **_(Speaks solemnly)_** I have been spending so much time with you, that now, **_I_** have to started make stretchy puns. You're rubbing off on me, in more ways than one. This is all your fault, you know.

 **Ralph:** Well technically, it's your fault, because how the hell am I not supposed to spend my time with the most awesome person in the world? 

Sue smiles at him and kisses his cheek. He presses his forehead against hers and absent-mindedly strokes her ring finger with his thumb.

 **Ralph:** **_(Speaks solemnly)_** Sue, I need to ask you a very important question. 

 **Sue:** Hmm…

 **Ralph:** Do you want waffles for breakfast?

 **Sue:** **_(Laughs)_** Please, I always want waffles. 

Ralph tries to get up, but Sue tries to pull him back in by stroking and grabbing the inside of his thigh. 

 **Sue:** Five more minutes.

 **Ralph:** Sue, I love you and all, but you do this every time. Every time you say five more minutes, we end up spending in an entire hour in bed. 

 **Sue:** But it's the best hour ever, right?

 **Ralph:** Hell yeah, it is. 

 **Sue:** **_(Nibbles on his ear)_** Five more minutes. Please? 

 **Ralph:** Well, that’s a very persuasive argument.

She climbs on top of him and starts kissing him, as Ralph stretches his arms around her waist. A part of Ralph, wishes that he could just fast-forward through the monotonous and mundane parts of his life, so he can skip straight to the part where he gets to be with Sue. No matter how much of their day they spend solving mysteries together, it always seems like there isn't enough time.  

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Panels for your reference: 
> 
> https://imgur.com/a/VLoFXnN


	29. High on hopium

Ralph and Sue are relaxing at the pub after spending weeks trying to track down and rescue a paramedic possessed by an indigo lantern ring. Sue is sharing her cop stories from the time she worked in Gotham and Ralph feels a twinge of regret as he starts thinking about the case that killed his career.

 **Sue:** **_(Chuckles)_** Think about it Ralph, ten years ago everything that we deal with now, would seem like a ridiculous fantasy. Aliens, speedsters, warlocks, demons and evil sentient rings that possess people actually exist and it’s like—okay let’s just deal with that stuff. It’s just normal now. People just accept it all, after decades and centuries of things being mundane.

 **Ralph:** I guess, stuff changes and you just have to accept it. I mean, what else are we going to do? I actually kinda love the increase in weird shit in the world. You know when I was twelve, I would spend hours trying to discover the existence of paranormal and extraterrestrial stuff. This one time, I accused my Math Teacher of being an evil alien who was trying to take over the world with the power of calculus. It’s all because his eyes would twitch at weird times and he would suddenly start yelling at us about how much he wanted probe everyone’s heads, just to make sure that we actually had brains. Turns out that he just hates people and snorted cocaine in his spare time. ( ** _Smiles)_** On the bright side, if it weren’t for my nosiness the cops wouldn't found his massive supply of cocaine.

 **Sue:** You know, you have told me tones weird of P.I. about fake long lost twins and spouses pretending to be dead, but you haven't told me about **_your_** cop stories.

 **Ralph:** I just like pretending that part of my life didn't happen. 

Sue gently strokes his hair and he finally decides to share this part of his past with her.

 **Ralph:** It’s just been so long since I carried a badge and a gun. That part of my life seems so far away now. My story is kind of typical, you know? I was starry eyed kid from a small town who came to a large city to become a detective blah blah blah, you can just play **_Don't Stop Believing_** now. **_(Sighs)_** All the other cops thought I was just a stupid clown. I was treated like a joke at first because well, I was kind of goofy.

 **Sue** : Was “kind of” goofy? You’re still dorky goofball. 

Sue kisses his forehead and he smiles at her, knowing that she loves his dorkiness.

 **Ralph:** I guess being a stubborn and over-excited sort-of but not really detective has its advantages. All of the sniffing around for cases and leads, finally paid off and I was promoted. **_(Smiles)_** I remember what Captain Singh said to me when he gave me the promotion. He said: You’re not dumb Dibny. You’re an astute man with good instincts and that will take you far. **_(Chuckles bitterly)_** Well, all of that went to shit once I made the dumbest career move ever. All of that hard work. Wasted. Years of putting up with people making fun of me and doubting how smart I am. None of it matters anymore. 

 **Sue** : Hey, **_(Cups his cheeks in her hands)_** you wouldn’t be the Ductile Detective if you hadn't gone through all of that.

 **Ralph: _(Sighs)_** I mean sure ** _,_** I regret losing my job, but I wished that I hadn't failed that woman and her daughter. Maybe I could have done things differently. Maybe there was angle that I didn't see. You know, I’m still trying to solve that stupid case in my mind. You know, it’s kind of funny how that asshole gets locked up for a couple of years for fraud but not for murdering his own wife. It’s easily my biggest regret as a cop.

 **Sue:** Hey it’s okay. Every cop has that one jackass who slips through their fingers and dodges the legal system. **_(Sighs)_** I get it, I have my own regrets as a cop.

 **Ralph** : What do you regret?  

 **Sue:** Well back when I was working in Gotham there was once case that really hit close to home. There was a 20-year-old Thai woman who had left her village and married this shady 45-year-old man in hopes of a better life. She um…she was in an abusive relationship with her husband and he was trying to pimp her out. It took me months to track her down. **_(Tears up)_** I…I remember how scared, helpless and broken she looked when I found her. I desperately wanted to place my hand on her head and heal her mind but I stopped because I was mortified of going insane and losing control of my powers. That’s the day that I really committed to gaining control of my emotions and powers. After that it became harder to live with myself, watching victims of crime suffer, knowing that I can ease their pain. 

Sue buries her head in her hands in regret and sheds a few tears as she remembers what happened to her.

 **Sue:** I still stay up at night, wondering how she is dealing with things.

Sue places her head against Ralph’s shoulder and he kisses her hand. He decides to lighten the mood by changing the subject.

 **Ralph:** So, how did things go with Peter and Hartley? Did you finally figure out your powers? 

 **Sue:** Well, Peter finally managed to reverse engineer our powers. He says that emotions are actual form of energy given off by living things. Empaths just sense and manipulate emotional energy. He thinks that there is an “emotional electromagnetic spectrum”. Just like speedsters are tied to the speed force, empaths are directly tied to emotional spectrum. Each color and type of energy represents a specific emotion. You know, yellow for fear, orange for greed, violet for love, indigo for compassion, blue for hope and red for anger obviously. Although I don’t know if willpower technically counts as an emotion or not, but screw it— it’s green for some reason.

 

 **Ralph:** Wait a minute, this sounds a lot like the space cop fairytales that Hal can’t seem to shut up about.

 **Sue:** I thought you loved hearing cop stories…Why aren’t you more excited about hearing about **SPAAAAAAAACE** cop stories?

 **Ralph:** **_(Chuckles)_** Don't get me wrong, I love Hal and all. He’s a great guy. We went on our road trip to Pluto in a shiny green bubble and it was awesome, buuuuuut he kind of has this habit, of yammering on about his adventures for hours. Like he will spend ages explaining the minor details and convoluted back story behind everything. This one time he told me about a guy who lost his home and tried to use a green lantern ring to rebuild everything. Then he turned into a power hungry psychotic asshole who decided to kill everyone and steal aaaaaaall of the precious rings. In the end, it turns out that he was possessed by a space yellow bug or something like that, so it’s not technically his fault. I mean, I just summed it up in a few sentences, it took him ten 2-hour calls over a week to tell me the same story. **_(Whispers)_** Sue, I’m going to tell you a deep secret, when he spends hours telling me all that stuff, I kinda zone out and don't really pay attention.

 **Sue _: (Whispers)_** Ralph, I have a very dark confession to make…I also kind of zone out when he does that.

 **Ralph:** **_(Chuckles)_** Sure, he has his weird ass and cool space adventures but c’mon man, I don’t need the Silmarillion here! Just give me the Cliff notes version of what happened. **_(Smirks)_** **_Sooooooo_** , now—I guess you’re a psychic ninja who taps into a magical rainbow of feelings, huh? 

 **Sue:** Yeah, pretty much.

 **Ralph:** Maybe you’ll start shooting rainbows out of your hands and you can make constructs that are miniature versions of you!

 **Sue:** What the hell? No! That’s not what I would do! I would do something more practical, you know?

 **Ralph:** Like what?

 **Sue:** **_(Smiles cheekily)_** I would make a gigantic rainbow slide and use it to get to work every day.

 

They try to enjoy their down time as much as possible before another major case pops up. Meanwhile Hartley is panicking because he hasn't seen Peter in days. They were meant to go out for dinner together after a drunken kiss at an after party. He has had no luck getting  in touch with him through phone or email or anything. He goes through the security footage and sees Peter disappearing after being exposed to a flash of blue light. Hartley immediately calls Ralph and Sue.  

 **Hartley:** He has just disappeared all of a sudden! He won't answer any calls and…and—

 **Sue:** **_(Speaks softly)_** Hey, it’s okay. Everything will be okay. We’ll figure things out. See, Ralph’s nose is already wiggling. **_(Watches the security footage)_** It looks like he is talking to someone, outside the window. I don't think he actually knows this person or thing based on how he responds at first. But he is slowly opening up to something. **_(Fast-forwards to the end)_** It's looks like he is a hypnotic trance towards the end here, maybe there is some kind of mind control involved.

 **Hartley:** Or maybe weeks of sleep deprivation finally got to him.

 **Sue:** Was there something or someone who was harassing him or anything like that? Has he been acting out of character?

 

 **Hartley:** Well he was a bit frustrated about not being able to replicate your empathic healing. He was disappointed when our first trial failed miserably, but aside from that he was his usual chirpy adorable self. Maybe he had been possessed by the purple ring he was working with. 

Ralph is carefully watching the footage and he spots something.

 **Ralph:** I don't think he’s been taken by the indigo lantern ring. Look at the refection in his eye. It's looks like a glowing blue ball. If he was possessed by an indigo lantern ring then shouldn’t his eyes glow indigo? 

 **Hartley:** Why is the ring gone then?

 **Ralph: _(Wiggles his nose)_ ** We’ll figure it out.

 

Over the next few weeks, a bunch of other people disappear after being exposed to a flash of blue light.  The case has been dubbed as “The Blue Light Disappearances” Captain Singh has assigned the cases to Ralph and Sue.

 **Sue:** Okay, so I have a profile for our victims. Based on my questioning as well as their histories all of the missing people, the victims show symptoms of depression and anxiety. Someone is specifically trying to target and exploit depressed people. All of them signed up to try the new form of experimental therapy at The Rathaway Institute.

 **Ralph:** Maybe, Peter’s behind this.

 **Sue:** What? 

 **Ralph:** Well, think about it. If you look at the timeline of the blue-light disappearances, then Peter is the first person to vanish like that. He is the one who is in-charge of running the experimental form of therapy, so he would have our victim’s personal details and he can sense their emotions. You notice, how he’s always tired and he has these dark circles under his yes. His hands won't stop shaking when he works on that specific project. C’mon, it's obvious, that the guy is burned out. Maybe he got really desperate after he couldn’t replicate your empathic healing.

 **Sue:** Okay, so there may be a motive here… 

 **Ralph:** Isn't funny how there is a flash of blue light when these people vanish and Peter glows with a blue light when he uses his powers 

 **Sue:** It could be a coincidence, you know.

 **Ralph:** Actually, there is the guy, Vicky—

 **Sue:** Wait—isn’t he the crazy drug addict conspiracy nut who was yammering on about alien experimentation in the sewers?

 **Ralph:** BUT, he was half-right about the sewer lab. Anyways, he told me that he saw one of the missing people with glowing blue eyes and they had tattoos on their arms. So, I stretched a finger and took photos of the street he mentioned for a couple of hours. I got a picture of the tattoo **_(Shows her the photo)_**.

 **Sue:** It looks like a parrot, pterodactyl bird thingy. 

 **Ralph:** Yeah! It's the same thing that Peter rambles on about all the time.

Ralph presses his palms against his cheeks as he lovingly watches all of Sue’s adorable and funny expressions while she tries to hatch a diabolical scheme.

 **Sue:** Okay how about this, you can investigate where these tattooed people are disappearing to. I’m going to track and down protect whoever else is left on the sign-up list. Then we could go undercover, disguised as the potential victims to find out what the hell is happening.

Ralph high-fives Sue and they get to work. Ralph figures out that the missing victims are meeting up at an abandoned fun house and Sue asks Barry to take the potential victims to a safer location. They disguise themselves and sneak into the fun house. Peter’s entire body radiates with blue aura as he hovers a circle of people with glowing blue eyes and unnaturally gigantic smiles on their faces. Peter creates constructs which resemble instruments and then suddenly—he starts singing.

 

**Peter:**

 

> **_(Sings)_ **

 

I can show you the world

Shining, shimmering splendid

Tell me, princess, now when did

You last let your heart decide!

I can open your eyes

Take you wonder by wonder

Over sideways and under

On a magic carpet ride.

 

Everyone else in the circle start singing and dancing with him. Sue and Ralph look at each other in bewilderment, secretly wondering if they should sing along too.

 **Sue:** **_(Whispers)_** The hell is this?

 **Ralph:** **_(Whispers)_** Did he abduct and brainwash all these people so he can realize his dreams of being on Broadway?

 **Sue:** **_(Whispers)_** Oh god, he **_is_** wearing one of those, magical alien rings.

 **Peter:** Hey everyone! I’m so glad that you could meet up with me. I am so excited, because we’re finally going to create our first worm hole today! Yay!

 **Everyone else:** Worm holes! YAY! 

 **Ralph:** **_(Whispers)_** Yay? 

 **Sue:** **_(Whispers)_** You’re taking pictures, right?

 **Ralph** : **_(Whispers)_** Yup.

 **Peter:** We can change everything! We can fix everything!

 

Everyone starts chanting Peter’s words while clapping their hands. One guy starts doing back-flips and screams passionately.

 **Sue:** **_(Whispers)_** He's is like a possessed super-powered motivational speaker.

 **Peter:** You don’t have to deal with all of that pain, loss and disappointment. You don't have to accept and live with past abuse, loss and betrayal anymore. Everyone gets a happy ending! **_(Starts pointing at people)_** You get a happy ending! You get a happy ending! Back Flip Guy definitely gets deserves a happy ending. **_(Winks)_** Love the enthusiasm by the way!

 **Back Flip Guy:** Thanks, man. 

 **Peter:** **_(Points at Ralph and Sue)_** You get a happy ending! 

Ralph smiles awkwardly and gives him a thumbs-up. Peter uses his ring to create multiple tiny hands and the light constructs start distributing cookies and milk. Ralph stashes a bunch of cookies away in his pocket, because it is a very important piece of evidence and also because Peter’s delicious cookies are made of magic.

 **Ralph:** **_(Munches on cookies)_** So…um how are you going to do the thing that you promised to do? 

 **Peter:** We can go back to a simpler and purer time. We can re-write history. We can just retcon all of the bad stuff and add in new fun stuff. Everything will make sense again. Everything will be perfect. It’s easy peasy!

 **Sue:** **_(Whispers)_** Shit, we’re going to get Flashpoint on steroids.

Peter tries to create a wormhole but nothing happens. He hears a voice in his head telling him something.

 **Peter:** Oh, I have to charge the green thing! Okie dokie! **_(Smiles)_** Hey guys, I’m sorry we couldn’t create our wormholes today, but I’ll be back in a jiffy.

He flies away, while Ralph and Sue bust out of there. Ralph gives Hal Jordan a call.

 **Ralph:** Hey Hal, we found another one of Sauron’s rings.

 **Hal:** Ralph, for the last time, the rings were not created by Sauron, they were created by different societies which harnessed —

 **Ralph:** Jeez, I don't need a long ass history lesson about how an alien tribe used purple rings to turn people into really polite zombies or how a magical fetus with tentacles created the universe. Look man, we are dealing with a really sweet guy who has been possessed by an evil ring. He has started a cult of brainwashed people high on hopium with a tattoo of parrot, pterodactyl bird thingy on their arms and they sing Disney songs together. Just fly over and help us out, okay?

 **Hal:** Is he the same guy who broke into my home five minutes ago?

 **Ralph:** Yup. Think so.

 **Hal:** Okay I’ll be there in a couple of minutes.

 **Ralph** : See ya.

They head to the Rathaway Institute to tell Hartley what happened to Peter. Sue assures Hartley that everything will be fine, while Ralph gives him all of the cookies he collected to cheer him up. Hal flies in and greets everyone. He reaches out to shake Hartley’s limp hand and Hartley cracks a weak smile.

 

 **Hartley:** **_(Panics)_** Can we get the ring off? Is Peter going to turn into Gollum?

Hal resists the temptation to spend five hours talking about how ancient the rings are and how they predate Lord of the Rings.

 **Hal:** **_(Sighs)_** I promise you that Peter won't turn into Gollum. Once we get the ring off, he will go back to normal. Until then the ring will influence and control him telepathically. 

 **Ralph:** Don't these rings give you infinite power or something like that?

 **Hal:** Oh, my god, you were actually listening to my stories! Anyways, in theory the blue lantern ring gives people an insane amount of power. The person can create whatever they imagine, but it's limited by the user’s imagination and feelings of hope. 

 **Hartley:** You do realize that Peter is an overly optimistic cinnamon-roll, right? The ring has an unlimited supply of hope now. So that’s great.

 **Sue:** Peter is not the only giving hope, here. Based on the way that the emotional energy and light is flowing in the photos; the ring is probably feeding on the hopes and dreams of the other cult members too. It's like these rings form a parasitic and codependent relationship with the victims. Hal, you remember how the yellow lantern ring possessed victims of abuse? Or how the orange lantern rings targeted the poor? I think that the rings are like predators which target people who feel powerless, helpless and vulnerable. 

 **Hal:** That’s the sort of thing that tends to happen with red and orange lantern rings, but the blue one isn’t meant to be like this. Well, on the bright side, hope is useless without the will power to make things a reality. The blue lantern ring is severely shafted without a green lantern ring. We can still handle this, you guys!

 **Ralph:** Yeah about that, you may you wanna look at this **_(Shows a photo)_**.

 **Hal:** Is that a corrupted green lantern ring? Dang. Well, now he can just shred the fabric of time and space. 

 **Ralph:** We’re totally screwed, aren’t we?

 **Hartley:** No, we are not screwed. We need a decent strategy. I know Peter seems invincible right now but if we can systematically take his pawns out and slowly drain his powers, we can beat him.

 **Hal** : Maybe, we can cut his connection to the green lantern ring with the yellow lantern ring. Fear does weaken the effects of will power….

 **Sue:** I can use my powers to manipulate the cult-member’s emotions and minimize their feelings of hope.

 **Hartley:** See that’s what I am talking about, we can use each of our skills in synergy. It's like dungeons and dragons but with aliens and meta-humans instead.

 **Hal** : I’m not an alien, okay. Why does everyone keep thinking that I am an alien? I just use alien tech!

 **Hartley:** Be more chill, okay? Here’s the plan. Ralph, you’re the most resilient and agile fighter we have, so you’re the tank. You can fight Peter, but you just have to distract him and keep stalling until we can get the ring off. Hal you're the magical knight, you can deal with and disarm the green lantern ring. Sue, you’re our Psion. You can deal with the cult-members and help us counter the mind control. 

 **Ralph:** So, are you going to eat pop-corn in the background or something?  

 **Hartley:** I am the wild card. The best strategies have an element of surprise. I’ll pop up at the last minute and distract him with my sonic gloves. That’s our window to get the ring off.

 **Sue:** Hey, that sounds like it could actually work.

 **Ralph:** Let our powers combine!

Suddenly a blue circle appears over Sue’s head and she gets sucked in. 

 **Ralph:** SUE!

Hal, Hartley and Ralph fly inside in a green bubble to the Fun house. Meanwhile Peter greets Sue with tea and snacks.

 

 **Peter:** **_(Smiles)_** Hey Sue! How are you? 

 **Sue:** I’m good. You know, aside from being kidnapped by a friend who is possessed by a possibly evil ring.

Peter gives her a purple velvet box with the indigo lantern ring. 

 **Peter:** I got a gift for you! Since compassion is your main emotion, I thought this ring would be better for you. Plus, you look you really fabulous in indigo and we can be ring buddies together! YAY!

 **Everyone else** : Ring buddies! Ring buddies! Ring buddies!

 **Sue:** Peter listen to me, this has gone too far. You need to get that thing off. I get that you have the best of intentions at heart, but you are starting to show symptoms of delusional disorder because of that ring. What you are trying to achieve here isn't very realistic.

 **Peter:** It’s not realistic? What do you mean by “not realistic”? We live in a world with aliens, magic and meta-humans! Anything is possible! 

 **Sue:** Anything is possible—that is, until you ruin the fabric of reality by screwing up the time line.

 **Peter:** BAH! The space-time continuum is just a teeny tiny inconvenience that we can totally ignore. I can fix your life for you! I can make everything perfect!

 **Sue:** **_(Speaks sarcastically)_** You sound like an infomercial. Are you going to tell me that you can make my hopes and dreams comes for $4.99?

 **Peter:** I can make your hopes and dreams come true—FOR FREE! Isn't that awesome?

 

 **Sue:** It's a cop-out. 

 **Peter:** If there’s anyone who deserves a cop-out it’s you Sue. Even though you heal people’s minds with a smile on your face, I can still sense you’re still being dragged down by your own trauma. Every single day of your life is an endless and exhausting fight against your own mind. Sure, you may be happy in Ralph’s arms, but you still have problems falling asleep at night. You still find yourself spiraling into a dark and hopeless place from time to time wondering when you’ll lose your mind. There are times when you panic for a moment, wondering is **_he_** will attack you again and drag you away. 

Sue’s eyes start filling up with tears as her mind replays the memory of Charlie assaulting her and her time at the meta-human experimentation facility.

 **Peter:** I can erase all of that. I can remove that emotionally abusive monster from your history. I can make sure that you never come here so you don’t have to bear the burden of being an empath.

 **Sue:** NO! **_(Cries)_** I am not going to re-write my past like a coward! **_(Speaks softly)_** I’m going to move forward. I’m going to heal myself. 

 **Peter:** I really admire your resilience Sue, but it doesn't matter how much progress you make or much therapy you get. You're still broken at the end of the day. You will never be the care-free, starry-eyed and utterly trusting woman that you use to be. After what you have been through, you will never be the same again.

There is a moment of silence, before Sue wipes her tears away and her eyes start glowing blue.

 **Sue:** I know that I’ll never be the same again—but things are going to be amazing. Because, I will make it that way.

Sue starts draining the emotional energy from Peter, but the ring is too powerful for her to counter. Ralph busts in to shield Sue from Peter’s blasts while Hal flies to the corrupt green lantern ring. Hal snickers when he spots the corrupt green lantern ring, but the smile on his face disappears when the ring starts creating massive constructs. A giant glowing green castle appears and blocks the path to the ring. A set of canons blast energy beams and the bricks of the castle start shooting arrows made of light. The goliaths on the glowing castle come to life and start attacking Hal. He creates a gigantic sword and shield with his ring to fight back. Meanwhile Ralph contorts his body to dodge Peter’s blasts and Sue tries to drain the cult feelings of hope to weaken Peter. The cult members slowly start to gain their free will back and Sue signals Hal to create a path for them to get out. He uses his ring to create a bridge going out of the fun house and the victims are escorted by Hartley who has been hiding in the corner, waiting for the right moment to strike. Peter creates energy whips with his rings but Ralph counters by morphing his hand into gigantic scissors to slash through his constructs. At this point, Peter realizes that trying to defeat indestructible silly putty would take an eternity and he decides to attack Ralph’s heart instead. He smiles as he creates a wormhole.

 **Ralph:** What’s that? 

 **Peter:** It’s a wormhole to the past.

 **Ralph:** And….

 **Peter:** You can use it to go back in time and fix everything. Isn't it great? 

 **Ralph:** Nah, I already give Barry plenty of shit for screwing up the timeline. Doing the same thing, would just make me a hypocrite.

 

 **Peter:** Ralph, please let me help you. I promise can make things better and make all of the regret, pain and shame go away. You can go back. You can fix everything. You can stop your father’s nervous breakdown from happening and it will be like he never left **_you_**. Your family will be whole, again. Your dad will tell you his cop stories and you’ll chat about your cases. Your mom will make you waffles and pinch your cheeks. Ken will get drunk with you at the pub again. It will be just like the good old days. I can undo that one minor life-ruining career killing mistake, just for you. You can be Detective Dibny again. You can erase those five years of hell. Don’t you want that? 

Ralph freezes when a giant blue lantern approaches him. The lantern shows him a vision of another life. His eyes fill up with tears when he starts seeing a vision of his entire family eating breakfast together, like they use to back when he was six and he’d spend hours trying to find free magnifying glasses in cereal boxes. He longingly gazes at the illusion of himself in his old police uniform with his badge and gun. He can hear his former colleagues praising him and lauding him as a hero. He cracks a sad smile, when he hears his father telling him how proud he is of him.

 **Sue:** Ralph!

Sue tries to break the ring’s influence over Ralph, but Peter breaks her focus by shooting energy beams at her. Ralph tries to resist the pull of the ring by focusing on the present and trying to imagine the future. He sees one thing: Sue. He remembers solving cases with her, eating breakfast together and going bar hopping together after a tough day. He closes his eyes and imagines himself globe-trotting with her, going into the space together and eventually marrying her. A giant smile spreads across his face when he starts dreaming about their life together. 

 **Ralph:** That sounds really nice. But that means that I don’t turn into silly putty and meet Mary Poppins.

 **Peter:** What does that even mean? 

 **Ralph:** It means that I am going to kick your ass, man.

Ralph elongates his limbs and ties them around Peter’s arms and legs. Hal finally manages to plough through the constructs and drain the corrupt green lantern ring’s power with the yellow lantern ring. Peter winces in pain as the energy is drained away from him. Ralph wraps his torso around Peter like a straight-jacket as Hartley pops out and blasts Peter with his sonic gloves. Ralph immediately stretches and slips his finger under Peter’s ring to push it out. Peter stops glowing and he falls into Ralph’s arms. Hartley rushes over and embraces Peter. He comforts him, when Peter starts weeping at this point and apologizing profusely. Sue heals Peter’s mind and they take him back to The Rathaway Institute. Hal thanks them all and takes the rings back to the Guardians of Ooa for safe-keeping.

 

 **Peter:** I’m so sorry. 

 **Hartley:** It’s okay Peter.

 **Peter:** It’s just, that I get so tired sometimes after all of my hard work ends up meaning nothing, you know?

 **Hartley:** It’s okay we are all trying our best to help people and sometimes our plans don't give us the results we want. 

 **Peter:** **_(Cries)_** You don’t really know what it's like, Hartley. I can sense their pain their suffering, their loss and their helplessness. I feel so much guilt because, I can't save them and heal their minds. Then this beautiful blue lantern appears to me telling me that, I can help everyone, I can save everyone and make everyone can be happy again. Everything can be pure and simple again. I just couldn’t resist. 

 **Hartley:** **_(Speaks softly)_** I know, I know… 

Peter rests his head against Hartley’s shoulder and Hartley kisses his forehead. Sue and Ralph, check up on Peter one more time before heading back home together.

 **Sue:** So, how did you resist the ring’s power, Detective Donut? 

 **Ralph:** I just thought about what I have right now. **_(Kisses her cheek)_** You know, I never thought the ring of hope was going to be evil…

 **Sue:** Emotions are complex and colorful things. Hope is a fantastic motivator when you are trying to hold onto something…anything, during dark times. But, it is utterly toxic when you hold to the wrong kinds of things. 

 **Ralph:** You know, what’s the best thing to hold onto ever? 

 **Sue:** What? 

 **Ralph:** You!

Ralph lifts her up, wraps his arms around Sue and starts kissing her. He use to believe that getting superpowers and becoming a superhero were the high points of his life, but now he knows that meeting and falling in love with Sue trumps everything else.

****


	30. Screw the Gorilla Illuminati!

Sue is quietly ploughing a gigantic mountain of paper work at CCPD while Ralph quietly stretches his neck into his office. She smiles when he starts kisses her cheek and nibbling on her ear.

 

 **Ralph:** Whatcha doin’?

 **Sue:** I’m trapped in paper work hell.

 **Ralph:** You know, I think you’re probably the most hard-working, brave, brilliant and badass detective at the precinct.

 **Sue:** **_(Giggles)_** Ralph, you're just saying that because you love me.

 **Ralph:** **_(Scoffs)_** Well, who told you that?

 **Sue:** You did. Don’t you remember? I went undercover and things went south. You came to rescue me, but I busted out of Sonar’s trap on my own and hid in the waste disposal container.

 **Ralph:** Eh, it doesn't ring a bell…

 **Sue:** **_(Smirks and speaks wryly)_** I popped out of a trash can. You screamed like a high-pitched chipmunk and I was covered in garbage when you told me that you loved me for the first time. It was **_really_** romantic.

 **Ralph:** I don’t know, I thought there’d more ambiance. The lighting would be more romantic and stuff. And you'd probably be covered in way less trash when I told you that I loved you for the first time. 

 **Sue:** Well, you just have to savor what you can. I mean, you did help me clean up after that. 

She bites her lip and smiles at him mischievously.

 **Sue:** _Buuuuuuut_ it took you forever to start doing any actual back scrubbing.

 **Ralph:** Well, I’m sorry for getting distracted by the most beautiful woman ever.

They both chuckle, as Ralph slowly shoves the paper work away with an elongated finger and looks at her with a twinkle in his eye. 

 **Sue:** Hmm, you are engaging in some really suspicious activity. I may have to arrest you…. 

 **Ralph:** Arrest me? For what?

 **Sue:** For being ridiculously handsome. Seriously, I think you might end up screwing up the space time continuum.

 **Ralph:** **_(Scoffs)_** Please, that’s Barry job, okay? **_(Chuckles)_** Look, I love eating donuts with you and watching Columbo together, but you know maybe we could go an actual romantic date.

 **Sue: _(Kisses him)_ ** M’kay partner. 

 

Ralph repairs an old gazebo and decorates it with fairy lights. He grabs Sue’s favorites: red wine, butter pecan ice-cream and of course, shrimp fried rice. When Sue opens her eyes to their “mysterious” romantic location she finds Ralph contorting his arms in the shape of a heart. They sip on wine as they play one of their many silly “what-if” games.

 **Sue:** What would I do, if I was a speedster? Hmmm…Okay, so I would travel back in time, create multiple time remnants of myself and we would be in a band together.

 **Ralph:** You know there are people in Team Flash who sing really well. Joe, Cisco, Barry— 

 **Sue: _(Gasps adorably)_ ** Maybe we should start a Star Labs Glee Club!

 **Ralph:** Yeah about that, Barry has a weird thing against Glee Clubs. I don't know, maybe he has some repressed traumatic memories of being in a Glee Club or something like that. You know what I would do with super speed?

 **Sue:** What?

 **Ralph:** I would travel the world—FOR FREE! Screw you, Ferris Air and your overpriced plane tickets! 

 **Sue:** You know back I was a socialite, I use to travel all the time. I always dreamt of finding a goofball who would travel the world with me. We could have all sorts crazy adventures together. 

 **Ralph:** Maybe we could do that together. You know, once we magically stumble across a giant pile of gold. **_(Sighs)_** I feel kinda bad for saying this but when Peter offered me a chance to travel back in time I wanted to say— 

 **Sue:** Yes. I wanted to yes too. It’s okay. 

 **Ralph:** I don't know how the hell Barry resists the temptation to use travel time to fix everything in his life. **_(Chuckles)_** I mean, the last time he tried to explain time-travel to me, my head imploded. But I wonder if Barry actually had a choice when it came to being the Flash. The whole Reverse Flash going back in time to create the Flash is like a perfect circle or something. Reverse Flash wouldn't exist if the original Flash wasn’t there. So, Barry **_had_** to be the Flash no matter what. It's like a time loop thing. I think. Okay I’m just bullshitting the science here. **_(Gasps in horror)_** What if our entire life is a time loop?

 **Sue:**   It’s so easy to fall into the trap of looking back at your entire life and saying something was destined to happened. It’s just your conformation bias. I don't really believe in that destiny nonsense. Every single moment of your life you make choice. We forget about all of the little choices and turns along way. If Barry really wanted to, he could have been like: Nope! Not gonna to do this superhero shit. I’m just going to run off to Arizona.

 **Ralph:** But how can you **_not_ ** think about what could have been with all of the alternative timelines and other earths. Did you know that there’s another earth filled with shrimp people? There’s even a universe without coffee. I mean **_obviously_** , it’s a hell dimension. You know, I just can't stop thinking about those other timelines. I mean if I could travel back in time, there are a million mistakes I would undo. Honestly Sue, I feel like I wasted five years of life.

 **Sue: _(Chuckles bitterly)_ ** Well, I know how that feels.

 **Ralph:** I wasted my detective skills on busting cheating spouses and helping conmen. I wasted my time getting drunk and rotting away in a rut. I can’t stop thinking about all of the people that I could have actually helped, all of the broken things in my life **_I_** could have fixed.

 **Sue:** I had the ability to heal people’s minds and I did nothing with it for five years, all because I was scared shitless of my own emotions.

 **Ralph:** Maybe there is another world where everything is simpler. Maybe I would already be Elongated Man when I crash your boring ass debutante ball. Then we’d fall in love, get married, travel the world together, go into space, meet Sherlock Holmes—

 **Sue:** Wait, where the hell did Sherlock Holmes come in this alternate universe? Is he like a real person in this alternate earth? 

 **Ralph:** I want him to be real, okay? I wish, I could just bend and twist reality so I could have spent those five years of hell with you instead.

 **Sue:** Ralph—we’re not going to get those years of lives back. They are gone for good. All of our past mistakes are a done and dusted deal. If a reality ripping, timeline tinkering speedster has to accept the loss of his parents, then we non-speedsters have to live with all the shit that happened in the past. Screw alternate time lines! Screw other earths! Other dimensions! Screw the Gorilla illuminati! Screw it all. Just…just be **_here_** with **me**.

 **Ralph:** M’kay.

 

Ralph stands ups and looks at the sky with a twinkle in his eye.

 **Ralph:** C’mere.

Sue walks towards Ralph and he pulls her closer with his elongated arms. He wraps his arms around her.

 **Ralph:** Hold on, okay?

Sue gasps in glee as Ralph stretches his legs and they slowly rise up above the city. Sue’s completely taken aback by the tapestry of lights and Ralph is lovingly gazing her.

 **Sue:** God, it’s beautiful up here.

 **Ralph** : I know. Sue...

 **Sue:** Are you going to tell me, that I make you feel like the tallest man in the world? 

 **Ralph:** **_(Panics)_** NO. No. I wasn’t going to say that, because that would be really corny.  

 **Sue:** Which is exactly why you would say it. 

 **Ralph:** Dammit Sue! Stop stealing my romantic dialogue!

 **Sue: _(Whispers)_** It’s payback.

 **Ralph:** Payback, for what? 

 **Sue: _(Smiles)_** For stealing my heart.

She pulls him by the tie and starts kissing him. For a moment, it feels like just the two of them are floating over the world in their little own bubble away from the monsters, the diabolical masterminds and the evil magicians.

 


	31. An Elongated Fandom

After getting a lead on another trafficked meta, Ralph quietly walks through the park and smiles as he spots the bench where he and Sue shared their first meal together. He starts remembering the first time he met her as Elongated Man. Barry and Ralph had saved a bunch of cops from hostage situation. Even though Ralph had his own costume and codename at that point, Barry was and still is, the official hero of Central City. Every cop at the precinct was vying for a few seconds with the Flash expect for one person—Detective Dearbon. She was the one only person who noticed **_him_**.

**_Three years ago_ **

**Sue:** **_(Taps Elongated Man on the shoulder)_** Hey.

 **Elongated Man:** Hey you wanna talk to the Flash, he’s right over— 

 **Sue:** No, I wanted to talk to you.

 **Elongated Man:** Wait, you wanna talk to me?

Sue nods her head and Ralph face lit up with glee. 

 **Elongated Man:** **_(Smiles)_** Do you like shrimp? 

They chat about all the weird shit that happened in Central City as they wait for their order.

 

 **Elongated Man: _(Stares at shrimp)_** I love you so much.

 **Sue:** Are you professing your love for a piece of fried shrimp? 

 **Elongated Man:** Hey, I’m just letting my soulmate know that I love her.

 **Sue:** Well, I have to ask, did you really fight a gigantic dinosaur skeleton that came to life?

 **Elongated Man:** Hell yeah, I did. Twice. I also saved the Flash from falling to his death by turning into a human whoopee cushion.

 **Sue: _(Chuckles)_ ** Please tell me that you're joking.

 **Elongated Man:** Nope. This one time we were inside Devoe’s mind and there was a clone army of evil Devoes on our asses. So, the Flash picked me up and spun me around. He was like sweeeeeeeee! And I was like pew pew pew pew! POW!

 **Sue:** So, let me get this straight the Flash basically used **_you_** as a bat to smack around an army of evil geniuses inside said evil genius’s mind?

 **Elongated Man:** Pretty much. By the way, I can also make balloon animals. Just so you know.

 **Sue:** How the hell does that help you fight crime?

 **Elongated Man:** Well, I’ll have you know that making balloon animals is a very important part of my superhero training. I practice on Tuesdays.

 **Sue:** **_(Sighs)_** God, I knew Central City had gotten weird over the years, but I didn’t expect things to be this…this insane. How am I going to deal with this? 

 **Elongated Man:**  Well, I can help you deal with the weird stuff.

 **Sue:** Really?

 **Elongated Man:** Yup. I’m probably one of the weirdest things here. I’m basically silly putty.

 

Barry had been searching for Ralph after the interviews were done and he rolls his eyes when he spots Ralph giggling and flirting with Sue. He tries to pull Ralph away but Ralph pouts at him and tries to anchor his feet to the ground.

 **Flash:** **_(Whispers)_** Elongated Man, we have to go.

 **Elongated Man: _(Whispers)_** Barry, you can’t just whoosh away like that without saying anything! It’s rude! **_(Waves back enthusiastically)_** Byeeeeeeeeeeeeee! 

A mildly annoyed Barry whooshed Ralph back to Star Labs for a typical Annoyed Allen lecture.

 **Barry:** Dude what the hell? Don't flirt with her in costume, she’s a detective! She will figure out your secret identity!

 **Ralph:** I already know that she’s a detective Allen, I saw her adorable photo in the precinct. Just so you know, I wasn’t flirting. I was just being a super friendly superhero. 

* * *

 

Ralph snaps back to the present when feels a gun poking his back. He turns around to see a familiar face.

 **Ralph:** Hey, you're the guy who tried to mugged me. How are you— 

 **Mugger:** Wait a minute aren’t you the guy who shot me in the ass?

 **Ralph:** Oh yeah. Yeah sorry about that. It was a total accident and I didn’t mean to—

 **Mugger: _(Points gun at Ralph)_ ** You’re gonna pay you piece of—

 **Ralph:** Dude what the hell? Have you learned nothing? If you shoot me, then you’ll just end up shooting yourself! And that’s just plain stupid.

 **Mugger:** Can I like, stab you?

 **Ralph:** Nah man, that won't work either. I’m basically silly putty. Everything just bounces off me. Hey, you wanna see a cool magic trick?

Ralph takes the knife from the mugger’s hand and slowly puts it inside his skull.

 **Mugger: _(Whispers)_ ** What the hell? That’s, that’s kinda cool….in a disgusting way.

 **Ralph:** I know, right?

 **Mugger:** Can I have my knife back?

 **Ralph:** No, it’s mine now. I also took your gun by the way.

They both share their life stories with each other over a few drinks.

 **Ralph:** Look Arnold, if I can turn my life around after being a sleazy asshole for five years, I don't see why things can't change for you. I’m like a superhero detective now.

 **Arnold:** So, I should get hit by dark matter, wear a really tight costume and punch people in the face? 

 **Ralph:** No man, get your shit together. Get an actual job. I know a bar that’s hiring and they’re not that picky. **_(Gives his card)_** Call me. 

Ralph waves him goodbye and quickly sneaks into his apartment, as he desperately tries not to disturb Sue.

 

 **Sue:** Detective Donut, I know you're here. You can’t fool me. 

Ralph turns around and grabs Sue.

 **Ralph** : Sue, the guilt is killing me. I thought I could take my deep dark secret to the grave, but I know that I have to tell you the truth.

Sue panics for a moment, but when she notices Ralph’s eyebrow twitching, she tries to hide the small smile on her face.

 **Ralph:** I ate the last donut. 

 **Sue:** **_(Gasps dramatically)_** How could you do this to me?

They both burst into laughter and Ralph leans to kiss her nose.

 **Sue:** **_(Speaks solemnly)_** But let’s talk about actual problems. 

 **Ralph:** Like what? 

 **Sue:** Like the fact that you do the same semi-awkward superhero pose in every photo ever. 

 **Ralph:** Semi-awkward? Please, my superhero pose is badass.

Sue cheekily imitates Ralph’s superhero pose as she puffs her chest out and places both her palms against her waist.

 **Sue:** By the way there is a bunch of stuff that came in for **_(smirks)_** ‘Elongated Man’. Some Maxwell Lord guy has bene spam mailing you like hell. And someone sent these weird ass pills.

Ralph picks up the pills and reads the cover.

 **Ralph:** Elongate your love life fellas…. Nope! Nopity! Nope! Nope! **_(Throws away bottle)_** Not gonna deal with that shit.

 **Sue:** **_(Looks at her phone)_** Oh no, Axel Walker is attacking Infantino street. Well, he’s probably going to monologue about his stupid plan so we have 10-15 minutes. I’ll start evacuating the area.

 **Ralph:** Be careful, okay?

 **Sue:** M’kay.

Ralph stretches onto the scene as Sue and Joe evacuate the area.

 **Axel:** ‘Sup archenemies?

 **Ralph:** Hey Axel! I’m totally going to kick your ass again. So, you can go back to jail and eat that, surprisingly delicious prison pudding. By the way I love your suit, purple really looks good on you. 

While Axel is taken aback by Ralph’s compliments, Ralph quietly stretches his hand and tries to steal Axel’s “hurty-squirty” gun.

 **Axel** : Oh—thank you. **_(Smiles)_** My mom made it for me! I have to say, you look way cooler in your new suit. Your old grey suit was fugly as hellllllllll. I’m sad that you ditched the badass mask though. We could have gotten matching masks, man!

 **Ralph:** Masks are overrated. It kinda gets sweaty and itchy under there.

 **Axel:** I know, right? But my mom told me that I have to wear one. 

 **Ralph:** I didn't really care about the whole secret identity thing. Coming up with lies, making up excuses and cooking up some story to cover my ass was way too much work. I couldn't be bothered with that shit.

 **Axel:** Well it’s nice chit-chatting with you Stretchy Jim Carey **,** but I have to kill you and stuff. **_(Pauses)_** Hey, wait where’s my hurty squirty gun?

Ralph smiles at him and casually swirls around the gun. Axel shoots a few ninja stars at him and Ralph smirks as they bounce off his chest. Before Axel can take out an axid bomb, Ralph wraps his torso around Axel’s body and restrains his hands. After CCPD apprehends

Axel, Sue chortles as she watches her dorky other half gleefully soak the attention form the press. Unfortunately, the next day Ralph obsessively re-reads an article written about him. Most of the article is filled with baseless accusations about how Elongated Man is secretly a super villain known as the Molder who melts people into silly putty, but a handful of quotes sting the most:

 

>   ** _“He’s an idiotic clown who cracks horrible jokes and is utterly useless during moments of crisis.”_**
> 
> **_“Instead of taking down a criminal he was too busy chit chatting with a psychotic terrorist.”_ **
> 
> **_“Obviously, he would be all buddy-buddy with a super villain since he is a selfish con man who has screwed overplenty of clients in the past.”_ **
> 
> **_“Ductile detective my ass. He’s a P.I. All Private investigators are hacks. Just because he tags along with an actual detective doesn't mean that he does any real detective work.”_ **
> 
> **_“Stretch Armstrong doesn’t give a crap about being a hero. He doesn’t care about saving and helping others like the Flash does. He is an attention seeking, media loving man child who is a superhero because he loves fame and money.”_ ** ****
> 
> **_“Maybe Discount Mr. Fantastic should do us all a favor and ditch Central City so he can finally realize his dream of joining a circus.”_ **

Sue leans over and skims the article. She lovingly looks over at Ralph and kisses his forehead.

 **Sue:** Sweetie, it’s just a badly written piece of clickbait.

 **Ralph:** A piece of clickbait that’s been shared like a million times.

 **Sue:** You know, maybe we could visit this Maxwell Lord guy. He has sent you multiple letters offering to be your PR manager. 

 **Ralph:** I don't know about that.

 **Sue:** Well, I actually spoke to Iris and she’d love to write a more accurate piece about you. I’m helping her pick out some of the people you rescued for an interview. It doesn't hurt to try this Maxwell Lord guy. Ninety percent of the clickbait garbage is bullshit. **_(Cups Ralph’s cheek and kisses his forehead)_ ** I just want people to know about how amazing you are.

Ralph reluctantly decides to pay Maxwell Lord a visit. The moment he opens the door to Lord’s office he is gleefully greeted by a man in a brown suit.

 

 **Maxwell: ( _Shakes hand_ ) **I’m huge fan of yours! I can't wait to work with you, I’ve already planned out your PR campaign.

 **Ralph:** Oh okay, cool. So, what’s your plan?

 **Maxwell:** I was thinking about having an online viral video campaign with a series of positive anecdotes from all of the people you saved. We could film a bunch of actors gushing about you, we can add a bit of sentimental music—

 **Ralph:** So, you're going to counter clickbait with a fluff piece?

 **Maxwell:** Yes! We are going to rebrand you. You can be a role model, a symbol of hope, a light in the dark—

 **Ralph:** A contortionist. A celebrity impersonator. A live action cartoon.

 **Maxwell:** Stop treating this like a joke. Your reputation is on the line! If you keep clowning around like this you will never be respected and venerated like the Flash. The Flash is going to get his own museum soon and what do you get? A “golden opportunity” to be a mascot for discount Viagra!

 **Ralph:** Look man, I’m happy for the Flash. He’s sacrificed a lot to save the city and he deserves that museum. As much I love the attention and free coffee, I’m really not doing this fame. As long as I can make the world suck a bit less, I’m happy. It’d be nice if a bunch of judgmental assholes didn't slander me and attack my character, but hey you can't get everything in life. Right?

 **Maxwell:** But what if—you could save the world **_and_** become a universally loved hero at the same time? People can idolize the Flash because they don't know about the average Randy behind the mask. They literally worship the Flash. I’m not joking. There is an online petition to start a Church of Flash. They’re giving away these nifty Flash rings with the little lightning bolts on them to get funding. Frankly speaking it’s a great—you know what that’s not the point. The point is that going public with your secret identity was a terrible publicity move. You should have kept the mask on. Now people know the screwed-up man behind the mask. They know about dirtbag Dibny and it taints the image of Elongated Man as a pure All American hero.

 **Ralph** : Great. You’re slamming me too.

 **Maxwell:** I hate to break it to you Ralphy, but back when you were a sleazy P.I. you had a crappy reputation and that crappy reputation will haunt you, because when people look at Elongated Man, they will see Private Dick.

 **Ralph:** You don't need to tell me that I was a sleazy asshole. I already know that. I know that when people will look at my checkered past they will judge me. I don't care about that. 

 **Maxwell:** Well you should care! Don't you care about your legacy as a hero?

 **Ralph:** Look, I’m going to completely honest with you. I know that I’m not that famous or that popular or even that important. If there was a TV show about superheroes I would be in the supporting cast in the best-case scenario. But let’s face it I’d probably end up having a glorified cameo as a shapeshifted vase. At the end of the day, I’m a stretchy weirdo who makes balloon animals. Who the hell is going to take **_me_** seriously? I know that I’m a joke. So, I may as well make people laugh. **_(Speaks softly)_** I mean, can you imagine how horrifying it is for a normal person without super powers to live in batshit insane city like Central City? Meta-humans, aliens, hyper-intelligent gorillas, and alternate dimension Nazis can just bust into your home, destroy everything and kill everyone you love. That shit is horrifying. I think **_everyone_** could all use a good laugh, sometimes. You know? 

 **Maxwell:** **_(Smiles)_** I know.

 **Ralph:** Look I have to meet someone, so we maybe can chat about this later on.

 **Maxwell:** Alright I’ll see you later.

 

Ralph heads to Iron Heights to check up on Axel. At first Axel rants about how Elongated Man technically cheated during their epic fight but the conversation slowly shifts to why Axel attacked Infantino street.

 **Axel: _(Cries)_** I just want my dad to be proud of me. You know? I thought hey, if I can beat stretchy Jim Carey, then he’d finally notice me. Maybe mom was right. Maybe he doesn't care.

 **Ralph:** **_(Sighs)_** I know how that feels man. My dad left **_us_** when I was a kid too and like the dumb kid I was, I kept hoping he would randomly show up someday. Look it’s obvious that your mom loves you a lot. You know, in her in her own psychotic way. You shouldn't take that shit for granted, man. 

 **Axel:** I know. Hey, thanks for visiting me and for you know, giving me free pudding.

 **Ralph:** I didn’t think that Iron Heights of all places would have some of the best pudding in the country. I can see why Barry cheated at cards for this shit. Look man, you’re finally going to the psychiatric hospital— 

 **Axel:** I don't want to go there! I like prison better. They have pudding. **_(Whispers)_ ** Those “mind doctors” scare the crap out of me.

 **Ralph:** this is your shot at rehabilitation—

 **Axel:** I don't want to hear it! I hate shrinks! I-

 **Ralph:** Your mom is there too, you know. 

 **Axel:** What, really?

 **Ralph:** I had to pull a couple of strings, ask for a few favors and help the DA on a bunch of her cases, but you’ll be in the same psychiatric hospital as your mom.

Axel breaks down into tears and hugs Ralph.

 **Ralph:** Hey, just promise me that you’ll try. You know take your meds, stick to therapy, all that good stuff.

 **Axel:** Okay. Pinky promise.

 **Ralph:** Anyways, now that we are done with that sentimental crap, guess what I brought?

 **Axel** : **_(Gasps adorably)_** Matching masks!

The guard outside the prison cell smiles as he watches Ralph and Axel posing together in their matching masks and taking selfies. Even though a bunch of other clickbait articles bashing Elongated Man start popping up, Ralph tries to shut his phone off and fall asleep. As he closes his eyes takes solace in the fact he may have managed to push someone else onto a slightly better path.

 

 **Sue:** Ralph! Ralph!

 **Ralph: _(mumbles sleepily)_** I don't want to melt puppies…

 **Sue:** **_(Smiles adorably)_** Ralph, look!

Ralph gets up and quickly glances at Sue’s phone. He immediately grabs the phone and starts reading Iris’s article. The article mostly recounts stories of people Ralph saved. One civilian gushes out how Ralph checking up on him from time to time and playing dumb games with him helped him cope with his trauma after being hurt in meta-human attack. The baristas at Jitters talk about how Ralph would take superhero selfies with and help them out whenever he’d drop by for coffee. The guard at Iron heights mentions how touched he was when he saw Ralph reach out to Axel. But there is one story that catches Ralph by surprise. Maxwell recounts how Ralph saved his son from a fire. At the time, Caleb was in tears having a panic attack but Ralph helped calmed him down with his silly jokes and cartoony faces. The _Elongated Man_ stretched himself into a giant bouncy slide and he asked Caleb if he wanted to do something really fun. When Caleb was sliding down Ralph’s back his fears melted away.

 **Ralph:**  Oh, so that's why he said he was a fan. I thought he was just saying that to kiss face. 

The closing quote puts a huge smile on his face:

 

> **_“There were multiple times when he thought about quitting the superhero business for good, but even during his lapses of cowardice and doubt it was obvious that he was trying to be a better man. The Elongated Man is living proof that even the most flawed and broken people can change and stretch to their true potential.”_ **

 

 **Ralph: _(Giggles)_** Stretch to their potential. I see what she did there. 

Sue smiles at him and kisses him.

 **Sue:** You’ve come so far, grown so much. You should be proud of that. I don’t know if this means anything, but I’m proud of you.

 **Ralph:** Sue, it means the world to me.

Ralph kisses her and he knows in his heart that Sue is and always has been his biggest fan. The person who believes in him more than anyone.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> One of the most fun things to do with superhero narratives for me is to look at real life implications of superheroes existing. It's great when a comic book or TV show explores the PR side of being a superhero. Elongated Man is perfect for this because he adores media attention and is a superhero partially because he likes the fame. Since he is open about his identity, it means that people judge him based on the shady track record as Ralph Dibny. I think at times the chapter got a bit meta because I ended up tapping into how the Flash fandom views Elongated Man/Ralph Dibny's character. I think one the things that I miss in the show is the hero's interactions with the public or the common man. There is so much focus on the big bad that sometimes we miss how the Flash impacts people's lives on a day to day basis.


	32. Do stretchy men get sick?

Ralph is spread out over his bed like a pale sick puddle, with his nose dripping whenever he sneezed. His squishy form is drenched in sweat and his old beer gut has made a vengeful comeback. Dark circles are nested under his eyes, but there is a sparkle in his eye when he spots Sue in her red dress. She smiles at him as she places the shrimp fried rice and donut cake near the bed.

 **Ralph:** Oh. My. God.  You combined the magical power of donuts and cakes! **_(Coughs)_** This is second most perfect thing ever! 

 **Sue:** Second best, huh?

 **Ralph:** Well you're the most perfect thing ever so the cake gets second place. 

 **Sue:** Hey, you feeling okay?

 **Ralph:** I’m getting there. I’ll get there eventually. **_(Smirks)_** Five hundred years, tops.

 **Sue:** C’mon it’s not that bad. Caitlin said your cold would go away within a week at most.

You know, since you could deflect bullets by existing, I thought the mighty Elongated Man bow down to the common cold. **_(Speaks nervously)_** I mean, have you **_really_** thought about the long-term implications of your powers on your health? 

 **Ralph:** **_(Scoffs)_** Of course! **_(Mumbles)_** Nope. Not really. Sometimes I panic when I think about how my powers will change once I become an old geezer. Like, will I just melt into a puddle of human silly putty when I’m ninety? Oh shit, I should have asked Caitlin about that, instead of asking her about how my stretchy powers would impact my **_(Coughs)_** you know….

 **Sue:** **_(Smiles mischievously)_** Mmmm…. I know. Well at least we made it to the two-year mark without monumentally screwing things up.

 **Ralph:** And we’re both still alive somehow in this weird ass city! Double yay! **_(Sighs)_** I wish we could have something more special, you know? Our first anniversary got interrupted by some violent asshole with a dragonhead. Eighty percent of our dates get cut short because of some convoluted mystery or some weirdo attacking the city. I mean you kinda signed up for this by dating a superhero detective. It doesn't help that I stupidly decided to ditch the mask. You’re stuck with giant red target on your back. I’m so sorry Sue. I’m sorry I can’t give you a more normal relationship. 

 **Sue:** It’s okay Ralph. Shit happens. Things don't have to perfect all the time. I just love spending time with you. You don't have to give me the sun and moon or anything like that— 

 **Ralph** : **_(Rambles)_** But I want to give you the sun and moon. And I wanna give you **_aaaaaaaaaaaaall_** of the rainbows and unicorns and puppies and donuts and hugs and kisses in the world. I wanna give you all of the schmaltzy shit. AND HOLY SHITTTTTTTTTTTT….

 **Sue:** What happened, Ralph?

 **Ralph:** **_(Whispers dramatically)_** You’re so beautiful.

 **Sue:** **_(Smiles)_** And you're handsome as always.

Ralph heart melts for a moment as Sue strokes his cheek and snuggles with him. They spend the night eating shrimp, slowly savoring the donut cake and watching Columbo. Sue falls asleep in Ralph’s arms as he strokes her hair. After years of spending his nights at strip clubs and gazing at the couples strolling by from his office window, he assumed that he would end up alone. He never imagined that he would find someone like Sue. He didn’t think that someone like her would actually love him back. He never thought he’d end up being happy with someone. Ralph chuckles as it hits him that he managed to spend two years of his life with a woman, which frankly speaking is more ridiculous than the idea of him being human silly putty. He didn't care about what would happen next, he knew deep down inside he wanted to hold onto Sue for as long as he could. Ralph wraps his hands around Sue and buries his head in her chest. 

He’s jolted awake when he hears a familiar voice calling out his name. His hand starts shaking as he slowly creeps out of his bed. Ralph apprehensively stretches his neck and follows the voice. The hall is lit by cold blue blinking lights and Mozart is playing in the background.

Ralph freezes as he stares at the screen in horror.

**Devoe: I’m coming for you, Mr. Dibny.**

Tears start streaming down his face as he shakes his head in denial.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Holy shit Devoe's making a comeback....WHAAAAAAAAAT. Ever since the finale I wanted to include a chapter that looked at how Ralph was impacted pscyhologically by being trapped inside Devoe's mind. I don't know if the show will explore the aftermath of Ralph being inside the Thinker's mind, but they should at least have one episode where they tackle the issue. I think we could end up with a poignant scene that is very similar to Ralph's speech in Season 4 episode 9 if the writers really looked at how he is handling his trauma. 
> 
> I was thinking about writing a sequel to Unpacking Mr. Dibny that looks at how Ralph copes after he gains control of his body in more depth. IDK.


	33. Out of my head

Devoe’s face disappears from the screen as Ralph falls to the ground. His sadistic brain starts replaying the gut-wrenching memories of being trapped inside Devoe’s mind.

After Devoe took over Ralph’s body, Ralph honestly thought he was gone for good. He didn’t imagine that he would have to spend what an eternity watching a monstrous sociopath use **_his_** body to kill innocent people. The screams of the guards, the blood gushing from their bodies, the rows of eyes begging for mercy were burned into Ralph’s mind—but Devoe just floated above the dead bodies like it meant nothing.

When he first entered the mindscape, Ralph was in his Elongated Man costume, ready to fight the Thinker and reclaim his body. But over the days, the Thinker slowly wore down his spirit as Ralph found himself spiraling into a self-destructive and hopeless abyss. He reverted back to his disheveled self as Devoe used his psychic attack as a leash to tame him.

With a single hand wave Devoe could flood Ralph with feelings crippling guilt. The sky would turn red and show horrifying images of Devoe slaughtering his friends…his family. 

Devoe would sadistically gloat about all of the times he was just **_so_** close to shattering Barry’s windpipe or the times he resisted the temptation to levitate Caitlin and let her fall to her death. Ralph begged. He begged Devoe to spare Barry, Caitlin, Cisco, Iris, Joe and Cecile. He begged him to stop. Devoe would snicker, as Ralph clung to Clifford’s feet with tears of fear and desperation streaming down his feet. 

No matter where Ralph hid, Devoe would hunt him down and continue sheering the fabric of his psyche. Every scathing, sardonic sentence Devoe uttered to tear him down still ring in his ears from time to time.

> **_They have already forgotten about you Mr. Dibny. Team Flash wouldn't care about a worthless waste of space like you. No one is crying over your grave. Not even your own mother would shed tears over your death. You’re not a son worth grieving._ ** ****
> 
> **_In the grand scheme of things, you mean absolutely nothing. You have nothing of value to contribute to the world. If I erased your mind and tried to enlighten you, it would be a pointless exercise, just like your entire existence._ **
> 
> **_You are no a hero. You are no Odysseus. You are no Heracles. You are a weak and pathetic fool who fell upon his powers. Just plain dumb luck._ **
> 
> **_I will crush and conquer your frail, inferior mind every single time. Your attempts to resist my psychic attacks and reclaim your body are inane. This is not your body. This is my body. You are only here to watch my glorious journey to the Enlightenment. _ **
> 
> **_Team Flash is not worth enlightening. Everyone you claim to care about will suffer a slow and painful death. Or I could execute them very quickly. The human spine is a very a fragile thing, Mr. Dibny. It doesn't take much effort for me to cause cervical dislocation._  ** **_If they are fortunate enough, their brain will stop functioning and they'll be unconscious. However, it's more likely that they will be conscious enough to experience their heart failing and their lungs malfunctioning as they suffocate during their final moments._ **
> 
> **_I spoke to Mr. Allen in your voice. It was marvelous seeing him fall apart in front of me and tearing up over someone as pathetic as you. I think for a moment he actually entertained the ridiculous notion that you were alive, but I crushed that delusional fantasy._ **
> 
> **_Thank you for the gift Mr. Dibny._ **

****

Eventually Ralph found a place where Devoe rarely showed up. Even though he didn’t hear the sound of another person’s voice for what felt like eons, one song kept him company.

> **And I think I'm going out of my head**
> 
> **Yes, I think I'm going out of my head**
> 
> **Over you**
> 
> **Over you**

 

He’d hum the song to himself whenever it felt like he was the cusp of losing his mind and forgetting who he was. Even though he had given up hope and accepted that he was trapped in Devoe’s mind forever, he took solace in the fact that his friends were still okay. He prayed that they were still okay. 

Ralph freezes in fear when he feels a hand against his back. 

 **Sue:** Ralph? 

 **Ralph:** S-Sue? 

 **Sue:** Hey, are you okay? I—

 **Ralph:** It’s okay. I’m fine. I’m perfectly fine. Everything is okay.

 **Sue:** Ralph, I can sense intense dread and fear radiating off you. What have I told you about lying to an empath about your feelings?

 **Ralph:** That’s it's really stupid and pointless? **_(Sighs)_** It's just…just one of my ‘Devoe’ dreams. 

 **Sue:** Oh.

 **Ralph:** You know, I thought I would be over that by now. Like Devoe happened years ago. He took over my body, did a bunch of crap, carried out his stupid plan and then I came back to life in a cartoony and stupid way. Done. Finit. Why is that asshole **_still_** hanging around in my mind?

 **Sue:** No one just gets over trauma. It’s something you have to learn to live with. It’s okay if you’re having nightmares about— 

 **Ralph: _(Mummers)_ ** I think…I think he’s coming back.

 **Sue:** You should get some rest for now. We can do a bit of digging together tomorrow. Okay?

 **Ralph:** Okay.

 

Sue and Cisco breach over to Oxford to go through all the details with Marlize. Meanwhile Ralph spends the entire week obsessively gathering and ploughing through mountains of evidence as he desperately tries to find something that could be tied to Devoe’s resurrection. He thinks, ‘ _Maybe he’s a zombie now. Maybe someone found his body and tried to bring back. Or maybe he like transferred his mind into someone else’s body with some kind of psychic wifi at the last minute and he’s been hiding in secret the whole time. Or maybe Devoe’s ghost took over some guy during some kind of techno satanic ritual.’_  

Barry, Iris and Sue as gaze with the Ralph with worried expression as a frazzled Ralph desperately tries to convince them that Devoe had returned. 

 **Barry:** Listen Ralph, we have checked everything multiple times—

 **Ralph:** HE’S COMING BACK! WE’RE ALL FUCKED!

 **Barry:** Ralph, please listen, Sue has already double checked everything with Marlize. All of Devoe’s tech is gone. There is nothing wrong with your computer. Cisco and Felicity checked multiple times.  Maybe you dreamt that Devoe was there. We destroyed the chair. We destroyed his lair and pocket dimension. Marlize destroyed A.I. version of Devoe.  There are **no** traces of Devoe. 

 **Ralph:** What if he came back **_anyway_**? He has back up plans for his back up plans. So maybe there was another back up plan and he actually planned for his death. 

 **Barry:** How do you think he came back? 

 **Ralph:** Evil Santa Claus! **_(Pauses)_** Okay, I don't know how he came back. But I’m telling you he’s back. My gut instinct is telling me he’s back and I saw **_him_**. I actually saw him on the screen. What he like backed up his mind into a cloud for something like that? I mean you should always back up your shit, right? 

 **Barry:** Okay?

 **Ralph: ( _Tears up)_ ** Barry—why…why are you looking at me like I’m nuts? 

 **Barry:** Ralph, please… 

 **Ralph:** I AM NOT NUTS, OKAY! He’s coming for all of us and I’m not going to let him hurt my family. NO. NOT AGAIN! I know! I will turn into a giant human fortress and everyone can hide inside me and then everyone will be safe and happy and no one has to die and everything will be okay!

Sue gently places her hand on Ralph’s forehead and slowly saps away his feelings of fear and paranoia. After days of agonizing sleep deprivation, he falls asleep in her arms.

 **Barry:** **_(Whispers)_** You know, I honestly thought Ralph had recovered after everything that happened with Devoe. I can't believe his suddenly hallucinating Devoe.

 **Sue:** Barry, we shouldn’t just dismiss what he’s saying. He already feels like someone is gaslighting him, maybe there **_is_** someone who is messing with him.

 **Iris:** I can see if any of my usual contacts have heard anything about Devoe. 

Sue’s phone pings and she looks at the screen with shock.

 **Sue:** Oh god. It says that Mercury lab just got attacked by robot samurais. Do you think— 

 **Iris:** It's Devoe?

 

Barry speeds over and takes the pack of robot samurais down while Iris and Sue start sifting through their sources. Eventually Sue overhears a man whispering about Devoe in holding. She does a background check on him before pitching her offer with Cecile.

 **Sue:** I have a source telling me that you have been mentioning rumors of Devoe coming back? What do you know about him? 

 **Mee Noi:** Why should I tell you anything? 

 **Sue:** You’ve been in meta-human tech black market for what—four years, but you’ll probably will rot in prison for at least ten years. I know that getting a decent lawyer is a decent fantasy for you. So, you could either waste a decade of your life in Iron Heights or— 

 **Cecile:** I can negotiate a shorter sentence for you. 

Sue sense longing, regret and sorrow resonating from Mee Noi. She sees quick glimpses of his daughter. 

 **Sue:** You can be with **_her_**. You can actually be there for your daughter.

Mee Noi tears up as he thinks about all the times he failed Lamai. He reminisces about how he justified going into the black market by telling himself he’s just supporting his family. The day he found out about Lamia’s powers he came to the horrifying realization that someday he could be responsible for his own daughter being trafficked by predators like Norvock.

 **Mee Noi: _(Sighs)_ ** Okay, I will tell you what I know. Amunet and Norvock worked with Devoe a lot. This lady in white would drop by every week to pick up tech from us and they wanted meta dampening tech that could block Vibe’s powers. Amunet was willing to give a really rare and expensive piece of tech to do that, if Devoe made something for us. One day he came to us, instead of the woman in white. He could _walk_. We didn't ask any questions at the time. He gave us this really complex and specialized computer. It had this A.I. which could design meta human tech and weapons.

Sue freezes as it her dawns on her that Ralph was actually right and **_he_** was in their home.

 **Mee Noi: _(Whispers)_ ** It had **_his_** voice.

Sue contacts Iris and tells her everything. 

 **Iris:** One of my sources works at a bar where people from the meta-human black market carry out their deals. They're panicking. Something has gone horribly wrong and he heard them say: We lost control of **_it_**. They lost control of the A.I.—

Sue’s phone suddenly shuts off and her screen starts glowing with a blinding blue light, as a familiar face appeared on her screen.

 **Devoe:** The Enlightenment marches forth.

 

All of the tech in the city starts malfunctioning as screens get dominated by Devoe’s face glaring at the horror-struck citizens. Meanwhile Ralph is lying at home in the dark as his mind replays all of his horrible memories with Devoe. A part of Ralph is trying to figure out if there is anything in his past that could help me. He winces every time he hears Devoe’s voice in his head because it’s a painful reminder of all the times Devoe would attack his psyche and bombard him with his scathing words. His eyes widen when remembers Devoe saying, _‘Another use of Mr. Dibny’s powers, technological reincarnation._ ’ Ralph gets up hastily as his mind starts piecing everything together. He thinks, ‘ _Wait a minute, what if he made an actual back up of his mind? He couldn't have used that power for the first time after I got my body back. He plans and overthinks everything, so maybe he tested out my ability a few times. Maybe he **practiced** reincarnating himself.’_

He rubs his eyes as he tries to remember the things Devoe did when he took over his body. He slowly starts remembering a lab where Devoe would go to from time to time. Whenever he went there everything would ‘shut down’ for a while in Devoe’s mind.

Barry speeds into Ralph’s home and turns on the lights.

 **Barry:** Ralph! Devoe has taken over everything and—

 **Ralph:** I know where he is! 

Ralph, Barry, Cisco and Sue rush over to an abandoned lab filled with old computers. They stare in awe at the main computer coordinating Devoe’s attack 

 **Devoe:** It's nice to be reacquainted, Team Flash.

Dozens of samuroids start emerging from the corners of the room. Their eyes turn red as the army of samuroids emerge whip out their blades. Barry starts phasing through the samuroids and while rearranging a few wires. Sue shoots at the samuroids with her lightning gun while Cisco blasts them and sends a few of them to a dead earth. Ralph yells as he uses his hands as a whip and he starts snapping the robots heads off. His face turns red as he huffs and puffs and snuffs the samuroids with hammer hands. He finally walks up to the computer and glares at Devoe.

 **Devoe:** I told you, I was coming for you and everyone you care about—

An enraged Ralph yells and starts relentlessly smashes the computer as his eyes fill up with tears. Eventually Devoe’s control over all the tech in the city stops and the samuroids shut down, but he can't stop himself as he takes out years’ worth of suppressed anger, resentment and feeling of being violated on a pile of broken circuits and wires. He finally falls on his knees and aimless stares at the shards of the broken screen.

Sue wraps her arms around Ralph and holds him as he weeps in her arms.

Ralph: **_(Cries)_** I was screaming. I was screaming at him when I…when he **_used_** me to kill all those people. I told him to stop. I yelled at him. “I don't want to kill these people. I won’t want to hurt my friends! Why are you doing this? Why are you making **_me_** do this? P-please stop….”

 **Sue: _(Kisses his forehead and whispers)_** It’s okay Ralph, I got you.

 

Sue strokes his hair as he finally let’s go of a burden he thought he left behind a long time ago. He hears a familiar tune in his mind:

 

> **And I think I'm going out of my head**
> 
> **Cause I can't explain the tears that I shed**
> 
> **Over you**
> 
> **Over you**

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Author's note: I tried to stick to my aim of posting one chapter a week for this fic. Unfortutnately I have been sick for the past few weeks and it's only now that I have gotten back to writing regularly. Anyways, hopefully I can go back to my weekly posting schedule from now on. 
> 
> I think a light hearted show like The Flash can gloss over some of the darker elements and implications of it's story. It's funny how the narrative doesn't fully explore the horrific concept of meta-human trafficking. Instead, Amunet is written as a cheesy villian who calls Caitlin darling. Devoe's entire plot of murdering people and taking over their body is really twisted. Season 4 was meant to be more light hearted but it ends up having disturbing elements like Clifford drugging Marlize and making her his slave. I wanted to look at how horrifying it was for Ralph to be trapped inside the mind of a sociopath who was using his body to kill people. The one thing that doesn't get explored as much in superhero fiction is how being a superhero takes a psychological toll on the hero. It's surprising for me that you don't see characters develop severe PTSD after horrifying events, like soldiers do. One of the harder things for me in this chapter was capturing Devoe's voice and putting Ralph through the ringer. I like Ralph and I don't like making him suffer like this, but I have to do it if I want to flesh out his charcater.


End file.
